In the Lonely Hour is less meaningless and vapid than a song as unapologetically hammy as “Classic,” but the result is unfortunately the same.

The album is pure homogeneous shitheap of stream-of-consciousness turgidity nonsense that strives to be different and to take you “somewhere else” but in the end really just ends up being hilariously bad and hilariously derivative of his past work and despite the frequent “so-weird-it’s-almost-cool” moments it still just plain sucks hardcore.

For much of Paralytic Stalk's first half and even for most of the more unhinged second act, Kevin Barnes strikes a near-perfect balance between pop mastery and a delightful sort of weird.

It is undeniably a step down from her excellent 2009 release, with too little suiting such a distinctive artist.

Almost all these songs are dynamically stolid and melodically immemorable to the point of interchangeability; the drum parts are phenomenally disappointing coming from a musician as talented as Jimmy Chamberlain; Corgan’s voice still sounds like old tarmac with inconsistent numbers of cars passing over it; and every song follows an identical progression from midtempo verse to homogenous chorus.

Not Without a Fight lacks the kind of hooks, fun riffs, and sing-along choruses that made the band famous and it also lacks the solid song writing that helped their last album not become a horrible failure.

While any change from that tired normality is appreciated, it’s disappointing that so much of this is mediocre, that so much of this imitative, that so much of this is overblown, and etc.

With The World I Want To Leave Behind, Moneen have grown up and taken a turn towards a more mainstream sound. The concern has to be whether they have turned too far and become just another run-of-the-mill radio rock outfit.

While it is still caught a little in-between moods and is clearly front-loaded, ‘The Optimist’ feels more instinctive than ‘Fantastic Playroom’, and is ultimately a step up because of that.

As expected, Duck wants to please everybody and this is the reason it fails to take off. ... They prefer the safety of the comfort zone, although they fare much better when they show some grit.

[Forever] ends up being a stitched-together collection of hackneyed, banal platitudes laid over tongue-bitingly asinine hook after hook, all so mewling and flabby there’s little to grasp beyond feeble stabs at nostalgia.

There’s just so very little here to work with, and even as a listener who’s dying to find things to like about this album, every minute spent revisiting it feels like a minute wasted. I sure hope they have it in them to rebound from this disastrous release.

This time around, deprived of their usual energy or lyrical quotient, they are nothing more than a momentarily likable diversion.

Walk It Off combines songs that attempt an idiosyncratic progression, but fail to expand upon things like, say, songwriting, with songs that struggle to capture a bright ol’ Indie Rock flame that was once there.

This record is brooding and shadows, joy and smirks, a blood-red dusk on a quiet desert evening; all emotion and sparkling instrumentation, confident of where it wants to go and even surer on how to get there.

In the end this is a nice EP to play and a timely release considering the season and what they're releasing it right before.

This delusional “growing up is bad” aspect of Bangerz is part of what makes it good, because it means that Miley can pull off things that shouldn’t work.

For all its inadequacies, Dignity is a solid, cleverly-constructed pop album.

The biggest failure of these songs, and the most confusing thing about this album, are the melodies.

Yours Truly, Angry Mob is such a sloppily put-together album that it almost seems intentionally bad.

Stripped of all excess, These Systems Are Failing delivers like very few others do in Moby’s discography. It will no doubt divide a part of his fan base like Animal Rights did, however, it won’t be as shocking as in 1996.

The very elements that made No Doubt popular in the first place have disappeared.

When they are on, they are very good, as their relaxing – yet strangely dance-worthy – grooves seem almost effortless. Yet, way too often, the duo simply bite off more than they can chew, meaning that when they are off, a 2nd listen almost seems like a chore.