Minimized guitar bluster emphasizes his ample vocal assets, but Flowers wilts when the sunny tempos subside, revealing himself to be an AOR softie.

Root for Ruin's dreamy ferocity is familiar, but the feeling of camaraderie keeps growing.

Lisbon, like 2008's You & Me, is a gorgeous journey into the elegiac, inspired by the music of Memphis' Sun Studios.

"Satan, your kingdom must come down," Plant croons on the penultimate track. Take that, Jimmy Page.

Linkin Park's fourth studio album (and second collaboration with producer Rick Rubin) contains plenty of aggressively arty material that might surprise fans of the megapopular rap-rock outfit.

Business Casual's libidinous wit can't quite match 2007's Fancy Footwork, but this day at the office still features booty calls, romantic squabbles, and digitally syrupy declarations of devotion.

Throughout Grinderman 2, the guitars and violins pant and howl with a visceral, veteran's swagger. Late middle age has never sounded so thrilling.

Although False Priest, Of Montreal's tenth album, is easily Barnes' most accessible, you can still hear his estrangement in the unpredictable chord progressions, the anxiously whimsical rhythms, and the distancing effects in the melodies that counter easy consumption.

Sorta silly lyrics like "Rollin' fast down I-35/Supersonic overdrive" indicate the road that Phosphene Dream navigates: It's all blacktop stretching through reverberating vistas--ultracool if a little predictable.

staying true to their party platform (sex, God, kissing, etc.), songwriters Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee remain the Ramones of sunbeam, patty-cake pop--even if they sound less like awkward twentysomethings singing about cats and bikes, and more like the countless post-'90s alterna-rockers who owe them gratitude.

Produced by Sigur Ros' Kjartan Sveinsson, Arnalds embellishes her debut's spare guitar-voice template with discreet overdubs, including brass and strings, enhancing breathtaking tunes like "Surrender" (which features Bjork adding a swirling countermelody). For those who consider Joanna Newsom too mainstream.

Tweedy's influence shows primarily on the two songs he wrote, especially the stoic title-track ballad. Yet the album's best moment belongs solely to Staples--a spare version of Randy Newman's "Losing You" that might well stand as definitive.

Sometimes the results are stunning ("Hearts of Love"); elsewhere, the barrage of studio effects leaves you wondering if they're merely covering up crap songs. Either way, Sleep Forever never bores.

The trio are certainly equipped for the challenge, since they're already experienced purveyors of foreboding, romantic, minor-keyed dreaminess; but their dub-tinged candle-flicker sometimes trades haunting for drab.

Majesty Shredding does favor a more thoughtful pace at times, opening up room for the occasional ornate sonic touch--a horn riff, decorative keyboard figure, even viola.

Yet if Johnson seems uninterested in Nashville's warm-and-cuddly act, he agrees with its insistence on crackerjack songcraft, and that keeps The Guitar Song from hardening into tough-guy drudgery.

Fleshed out with sinister synths and laid-back drums, the Swedish folkie's songs breathe and groove like never before.

Underworld is freed up to focus on crafting memorable tunes that hark back to their electronica heyday, as well as more personal, coherent lyrics. Earnest emotions surprisingly suit these dance-floor surrealists.

The crisp arrangements often overshadow his stiff, stentorian delivery, but he still manages to convey moments of both personal loss--the death of mentor/Slum Village rapper Baatin--and professional triumph.

The rhythm section no longer plays the shadows either, blurting out Black Flag–circa-'81 bluster as a deceptively simple assist for their leader's colorful wheedle and strident wail.

Drawing is occasionally eager and unstoppably pleasant, but just as often drifts as dazzles.

Though the title hints at darker turns, the album never steps out of the glare.

These adventuresome Swedes, led by instrumental virtuoso Gustav Ejstes, might be inspired by psychedelics, but they never leave anything to chemical-enhanced chance on their moody, lovely fourth album.

Interpol sounds both strangely distant and overly familiar, like a band struggling to remember who they are.

Newly aching but still introspective, the Thermals remain a revelation.

Points added for the tiered release options, including a tour laminate for the most devout, and sticking with the drill-press guitar thing. Points deducted for inventing nu metal--still more for songs that won't let an audience forget it.

Polishing the snappy pop of their 2008 debut, the Philadelphia-based trio crafts thoughtful tunes about relationship angst and introspective wandering, though it's often hard to get past drummer Jesse Kristin's fidgety beats and Ben Thornewill's hyperactive piano.

I'm Having Fun Now is all whimsical, tongue-in-cheek cutesiness, but with songs this sugary, it'd be churlish to complain. Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis and singer-songwriter/boyfriend Johnathan Rice have both had their moments of pure-pop confection in the past, but never as crazily delicious as here.

Recording new material live in a series of concerts with his longtime road band is the best idea Thompson's had since he ditched soul-muting '90s producer Mitchell Froom.

Bingham made Junky Star with Crazy Heart collaborator T-Bone Burnett, but the A-list producer mostly resists applying his trademark chamber-roots atmosphere.

The sonic expansion is admirable, but perhaps a trip to Miami--instead of Berlin, where some of Weather was recorded--might've been a better atmospheric adjustment.

Wallentin has reined in her seductive-foghorn voice, and Wildbirds & Peacedrums are a more subtly compelling band for it.

Perry delivers the gurl-gone-wild stuff with requisite sass, but she actually sounds more engaged on "Not Like the Movies" and "One That Got Away"--quieter cuts that recall her singer-songwriter days at L.A.'s Hotel Cafe.

Overall, Hawk faithfully follows its predecessors' dusty Americana blueprint, trading a standout Hank Williams cover for two by Townes Van Zandt.

This Montreal band's second full-length expands the abrasive post-hardcore and tender, tuneful poles of 2007's Some Are Lakes with help from members of Arcade Fire, Stars, and Besnard Lakes.

Here, they deliver the sort of mid-tempo, orch-pop fussiness that they'd been praised for transcending.

The wordless howl of delight on the exuberant gospel stomper "Looking Up" is Everett's most compelling statement yet.

Guitar-less but heavy on the organ, sax, and hands-to-the-heavens claps, this home-recorded debut swings like demos of actual '60s hits. Lyrically, it's less finessed.

Kudos to main Pretender Chrissie Hynde for changing the script: Her collaboration with young Welsh singer JP Jones feels fresher than anything she's done in years.

With ridiculous Auto-Tuned hooks, filthy lyrics ("Bustin' on your ass / Can't believe I said that / Never been a racist / I left her with a wet back"), and jittery beats from Young L and the Cataracts, it's worth putting your name on the guest list.

Even Klaxons' most ominously rambunctious tracks grind out plenty of bug-eyed dream-pop chants.

All Delighted People documents his struggle between fealty to the here-and-now and preparing for the hereafter; accordingly, it's unwieldy, schizophrenic, and frequently devastating.

Equally comfortable with dance grooves ("When I'm Alone"), country-tinged laments ("Everywhere I Go"), and epic pop dramas ("Loosen the Knot"), Illinois-bred, California-based Elisabeth Maurus is a promising work in progress on this smoothly produced debut.

You've been touring nonstop in support of your first new album in seven years. What do you do next? If you're Texas-based scrungers Toadies, you redo your unreleased second album, recorded in 1997 and rejected by Interscope, presumably for lacking another "Possum Kingdom," which drove their debut Rubberneck to platinum sales.

Wilson is clearly energized, and it's delightful to hear one virtuoso finally meet up with another.

There's not much emotional nuance in Ray LaMontagne's fourth album, which maintains a brokenhearted downer elegance, similar to Neil Young at his most somber and sepia-toned, sung in a beautiful wail that Van Morrison might envy.

Modern Rituals feels like an encouraging first draft, waiting for the distinctive touches that would complete it.

The third album (and first for a major) from this Boston-born, Mississippi- and Chicago-bred singer-guitarist is bound to inspire Sam Cooke comparisons, but Get It just as frequently stirs up Jackson 5 dance fever.

Radiant with apocalyptic tension and grasping to sustain real bonds, The Suburbs extends hungrily outward, recalling the dystopic miasma of William Gibson's sci-fi novels and Sonic Youth's guitar odysseys.

Sad-eyed generalists with a knack for cinematic spookiness, they aspire to Wolf Parade's adventurousness, but often descend into lumbering, Interpol-style self-seriousness.

All Night Long posits Buckcherry as your ultimate all-night rager soundtrack; the fist-pumping anthem-makers who are best heard on 5 a.m. IHOP runs.

He's a natural co-conspirator: Collaborations with Drake, Young Jeezy, and T-Pain lack the BBQ spare-rib smokiness of vintage UGK, but still satisfy.

King of the Beach's specialty is Warped Tour–ready choruses, charred with noise and peppered with lyrics from a self-hating surfer teen who sees sunburn as spiritual penance for being a burnout.

Weirdly calm yet supremely uneasy, On the Ones and Threes fluctuates constantly from folk to psychedelia to grunge, often in a single song.

With double-time beats, Trent Reznor-level distortion, lost-in-the-matrix digital doodles, and the occasional gunshot, megamixxx3 works like a headbanger companion to El's 2007 album, I'll Sleep When You're Dead-soaring, paranoid, and ghoulish.

Gibbs elevates this eight-song EP above '90s-gangsta-rap homage with his baritone-deep hauteur and studious lyricism.

Previously, that technique fostered playfulness, but Menomena's fourth album mostly just broods.

Crazy for You is a soundtrack to bikini season as it's actually experienced, racked by impossible expectations and as high as the tide line.

The Bronx native's tenth LP is consumed by legacy: his lengthy career, his harrowing life, and his craft.

What elevates their debut beyond your average twee-punk rager is the gentle psych dabblings.

Ross's greatest tool is still his presence, which vouches for the strength of his persona when his lyrics can't.

It's not an essential set, but there's enough here (take the gallant "Grand Army Plaza" for a stroll or seven) to tide you over till the Veckatimest crew sets sail again.

Tightly wound to the point of unease, the Brooklyn singer-pianist's third album has its occasional irresistible moments.

From grandiose opener "Pink City" to the haunting mixture of reverberating voice and piano on the title track, it's evident that singer-songwriters MJ Parker and Charlie Cokey have closely studied Veckatimest's artisanal harmonies.

Aside from "Lovealot," she proudly proclaims her intentions as a first-world pop star, de-emphasizing found collage and "third-world democracy" for melodic sway and punky bluster.

His persistent self-flagellation could do with more hooks, but Remember packs pain by the pound.

Fussy knob-twiddling grounds a couple of tracks, but this skyward-reaching album delivers plenty of solidly earthy pleasures.

Like Paul McCartney, Crowded House leader Neil Finn possesses a massive melodic gift, but no longer seems interested in writing anthems (à la "Don't Dream It's Over"). That's okay when the results feel as intimate as they do here.

The big shift on his beautifully recorded, intermittently moving fourth album under the Sun Kil Moon moniker is that only his nylon-string guitar plucking now accompanies his wounded croon.

Aided by producers Organized Noize and Mr. DJ, Sir Lucious Left Foot is a monster of an album.

Minogue delivers bliss like no other (wo)man or machine.

Trent Reznor's dark symphonies of clank succeed when their bleakness is broken by moments of humanity or hilarity, both of which come from the Nine Inch Nails mastermind's serrated scream. But when Reznor's haunted-spaceship beats combine with the seductive coo of former West Indian Girl vocalist Mariqueen Mandig (his wife) on the trio's debut EP, the results too often suggest a plodding, Matrix-style soundtrack.

Four years on, Night Work finds the band mimicking Eurodisco on the cheeky title track, the Cars on "Skin Tight," Kraftwerk on the stiff "Something Like This," and Animotion's "Obsession" on pulsing first single "Invisible Light," just a step behind the times.

Over brutish synths and hammy bleats, the puerile brosefs' third album shares, among other witticisms: Gonna have a house party in my house.

Early EPs were lumped in with math and prog bands, but those impulses recede on this debut full-length: Clearly there's some showing off on "Carrying the Wet Wood," with intricately intertwined fretwork and drumming, but it's all in service of sing-alongs, tied together by Dave Davison's pinched, inimitable voice.

The third album from New Jersey's Steel Train is a textbook example of how to use splashy arrangements and high-octane performances to enhance tepid material.

The wonderful Street Songs of Love brightens slightly without losing intensity.

The title of the Roots' ninth studio full-length suggests a more fulfilled mood (Obama victory, gig as America's favorite late-night house band), at least compared to the screw-faced abyss of their last two records.

The Miami-born, Paris-based socialite subsequently wastes most of her somewhat-dated debut album boasting about MySpace friends and fiddling with torturous, Ed Banger-produced synth pop.

Steadfastly chirping crescendos, whinnying breakbeat stampedes, and the odd evocative vocal.

We Are Born accentuates Sia's goofy party-girl side: Produced by Lily Allen's mate Greg Kurstin, it's full of up-tempo electro-pop jams that sound like Amy Winehouse covering Toni Basil's Mickey.

So is Recovery a classic album? No. But is it an essential one in shaping Eminem's future? Absolutely.

Ghosts' flowing, synth-backed melodies are a vast improvement on 2006's hammy In Our Bedroom After the War, if not 2004's near-perfect Set Yourself on Fire. Cute isn't what Stars aim for, but it's often what they achieve.

Throughout, Randolph's playing is joyously flashy, yet never glib or predictable.

On Body Talk Pt. 1, Robyn confidently chronicles the heartbreak ("Dancing on My Own") and pleasure ("Dancehall Queen") of epic disco nights like she's ready to rule.

American Slang sticks to the template Fallon's been hammering away at since the band's beginning; its stories star the same kind of characters and its garage-punk sound still sparkles with flashes of Motown and R&B.

The abundance of spacey synths and clattering, reverbed percussion makes Thank Me Later feel like ideal cruising music for a ramshackle UFO, but it also incorporates dynamics like few other hip-hop albums before it.

Two years later, our Canadian antiheroes return with something deeper than digital histrionics and crazily infectious beats.

Bless their Glaswegian hearts, they never sound bitter, 15-plus years after their brief alt-rock moment.

Buried under reverb, distortion, and computer st-st-stutter, our pop astronaut mostly wastes the forward-thinking production with cringeworthy lines.

He can disavow his youthful rage all day, but Gabel is at his best when he's feisty.

They hew to a similar early-'70s aura -- nodding to a time when spacey keyboard effects and alt-country dust carried serious cachet.

Each track on this Canadian quartet's second full-length opens with some clever reshuffling of precise drum pecks, TV-hum synths, Strokes-like guitar, and David Monks' reedy, wry vocals. Three minutes later, you're left with the mildly pleasing, indistinct memory of yelped choruses, mathy breakdowns, and mid-tempo breeziness.

Before Today still sounds like it was dubbed to cassette and left on the dash of a 1983 Datsun for an entire summer. Every aspect seems faded and warped, but that doesn't obscure Pink's savvy maneuvering.

Black Dirt delivers sulky dirges ("Blood Moon"), alt-country hangovers ("Mange"), and funeral ballads ("Goodbye, Dear Friend") with equal aplomb, as their leader's bedraggled voice groans with hard-earned heaviness.

While Temple's hermaphroditic alto endures the costume changes, the songs often don't, and the couple of undeniably great tracks -- like the rigid, kinetic "Collector" -- get lost in the parade of influences.

Four albums on, Mike Stroud and Evan Mast have barely altered their instrumental electro/indie/hip-hop hybrid, except to expand and refine its tasteful details.