A collection of workmanlike whimsy... [12/2000, p.225]

Not Without a Fight bobs and weaves between chugga-chugga riffs and poppy lead licks, with Jordan Pudnik's well-meaning whine bouncing off Chad Gilbert's more assertive (and appealing) bark.

They're still not so great at turning their majesitc heft and pushy paradiddles into memorable songs with hooks. [Oct 2006, p.100]

It's easy to miss the bright counterweight that has kept his old-soul melancholy afloat in the past. [Sep 2006, p.100]

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

It's all quite mesmerizing, until you notice the overworked lyrics, which weakly describe heartbreak in terms of weather, stars, and, uh, hearts. [July 2008, p.100]

This isn't Watch the Throne, full of rich and weighty contributions from a man who is still enormously talented. It's rap music as a transaction, with a host of stars and hip names wrangled together to convince you it's not.

Their debut begins with a rousing arena-rock anthem called 'Death' and then delivers detached variations on the same subject for the next nine tracks with a professionalism that's simultaneously compelling and creepy.

For the first half of the album, this tested formula works as well as ever.... Moone runs out of flavor, however, when the Apples trade colorful and ebullient for derivative and listless.

Beaty and bouncy but less meaty, Palo Santo is for now an unsatisfying follow-up to a terrific debut.

Gossip lack the kind of anthems that demand a live document. [May 2008, p.100]

Overall the young rapper's glorious flare of an introduction has not been brightening. His latest, Summer Knights continues this trend.

Unburdened by Kanye's melancholia or Eminem's vertiginousness, Roth is perfectly likable, and perfectly bland.

These tracks lack the energy to power a glow stick. [Mar 2004, p.96]

The writing still can be vividly evocative, but the uninspired, folky arrangements make her words too easy to ignore.

Despite numerous cameos from his mates, Drew still sounds orphaned and adrift. [Oct 2007, p.96]

With a hot guest list (Ciara, T.I.), this is bound to bump the clubs, but beyond that, it's clown time.

Expectations is an insistent but uneven album that points toward greater musical ambitions than it achieves. The sound is pleasantly aquatic and soft-edged but fussy and overwrought, as though its architects were worried that too much downtime might spur listeners to click away.

Sloan returns with this more digestible 13-song opus, but their essential blandness remains unchanged. [July 2008, p.104]

It leaves us with a streamlined New Romantic sound, but one that at times feels like emotional Teflon.

When consumed passively, as ambient music, his conceptual flaws recede into the fuzz of his production, a raw mush of sound that provides an appropriate and occasionally great backdrop for refreshing your Tumblr dashboard, at least until it delivers a more engaging artist to look at.

Acid Tongue is glossed up at the expense of Lewis' charming flaws.

The fact that the album's best moments are in the details--a fiery lick, a wailing vocal ad-lib--speaks to the singer-guitarist's recurring problems: secondhand song structures and little to say beyond self-helpy reiterations of lyrical beatitudes.

The problem is that the rantier Bemis gets about poseurs, the more he forgets to write hooks for his invectives, which strive for Real Boy's Broadway-punk propulsive grace, but strain under the weight of unsingable lines.

My Bloody Underground emphasizes the band's trippy side, often at the expense of Newcombe's undervalued tunecraft. [May 2008, p.96]

Their songs excavate new depths of frivolity. [Aug 2003, p.119]

Libertad does improve slightly on the mostly hookless choogling of the band's 2004 debut, "Contraband," with songs that are punchier and a bit more memorable.

Hey, if the Spank Rock and M.I.A. collaborator wants to two-step around in just a tank top, rude bits to the wind, that’s her prerogative--but there are consequences, and that’s where I Love You struggles.