Little Broken Hearts is exciting because it explores the darkest corners of betrayal, bad love, and jealousy with enough vitality to propel Jones out of the bloodless purgatory of brunch music.

Amid all the fight songs, Santigold's sensitive interludes only bolster her power, her harmonies rendered more invincible for their vulnerability.

Amadou and Mariam were wise to forgo a full-on return-to-roots move: They're no kind of traditionalists, let alone folkies, and if their songs lovingly reimagine Bamako, cosmopolitan Paris is their spiritual, as well as their physical, home.

Like the sugar in hot sauce, all the additional soulful and jazzy flavors - pale blue chords, sax-y loops, mellow piano comping - just bring out the stinging attack of the beats more fiercely.

Somehow they've upped their jubilation game without making too many sonic changes since 2005's self-titled debut.

Pluto wears that influence loosely, without ever feeling formally indebted to it.

Nominal solo debut notwithstanding, Blunderbuss is the sound of a mid-career stride.

Heartbreaking Bravery is both entryway and endpoint, a listening experience that's harrowing and gripping and, no matter how you come at it, moving. In other words, it remains true to its title.

Despite (or maybe because of) his peculiar web of influences, Beal is a strikingly singular performer, synthesizing various muses into something deeply unique.

God's Father is, in that sense, the most fulfilling Lil B release yet.

Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded, like a Whitman's Sampler, has something chewy for everyone.

A magic carpet of woven steel, Transverse soars up and out, borne aloft on ghostly vocals and sheets of guitar noise.

Taken as an hourlong whole, though, Noctourniquet really does feel like the band's most accessible effort in years.

Mixed Emotions falls right into place, then, indulging both musical and emotional nostalgia without falling victim to any particular trend.

Maybe the Ting Tings have pulled some sort of Lou Reed maneuver here. Maybe this is their Lulu.

While Mr. M consists of 11 allegedly different songs, the album has the unified feel of a single multi-movement suite.

For every instance that seduces you with K.R.I.T.'s prowess behind the boards, though, the mixtape throws up a song that pushes things back into an unfulfilling zone.

The efficiency of his drollness has grown uncanny, in fact, and the creepiness of its perfection is part of the fun.

The rest of the album can't match that evocative pang on [best track No I Don't]--something like hot coals against cyborg flesh--and is generally more direct.

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.

There are just enough bright spots to make this all worthwhile for those too old to wear BAPE.

The best songs bear the mark of an auteur weirding out, by himself.

The second half of this album is far more earnest; and in related news, far less fun.

This unpredictability -the 25-year-old band's trademark attraction--is what keeps them at the forefront of metal's vanguard, and what makes Koloss, for all its "normalcy" (joke quotes intended), the first real contender for the genre's album of the year.

Sir Paul McCartney has made an utterly forgettable, featherweight record designed primarily to appeal to Sir Paul McCartney.

For all the banging beauty in its beats, Evolve or Be Extinct is too forced and uncomfortable, as though he figured he'd evolve if he just over-thought it enough.

As a whole, though, Careless World is simply mediocre.

The delicate balance of good-then-bad-then-good-again ideas and taste appears rarely on WZRD.