Beware emulates and elaborates on the familiar, and Oldham's strengths as a songwriter and bandleader shape the album into something beautiful.

His melodies, whether delivered in an affected falsetto (closer to Animal Collective than the Beach Boys) or a grumpy baritone, are simple and hummable to a fault--without the energy of the distorted cassette recording, I have a feeling the songs would be a bit too cloying.

The rest of this satisfying album is a classic Hal Willner production, complete with the unusual cover choices (Decemberists, Espers, very late Eno) and the usual Willner Family Players (Nick Cave, Antony Hegarty, Rufus Wainwright, Marc Ribot) in back-up duties.

I had to make several return trips to the lyric sheet to clear up which songs were love letters and which were screw-yous. But this sort of tone-deaf emotional bludgeoning tends to work in her favor on monstrous power ballads.

Peyroux still sounds like Peyroux, only more so. Which isn't a bad thing either.

Perkins's simple, folk-hymn melodies are helped along by New Orleans brass, harmonica, B-3 organ, and harmonium, their trumpeting and wheezing sounds adding levity to blunt statements.

Hecker's sonics are huge and unrepentant, but they tease the ear; individual sounds are highlighted by their sustained revision.

Song of the Pearl may not be full of surprises, but it provides a fresh trip through familiar territory that's more than idle nostalgia.

The Truth Is Here is his second perfect disc in that many years and just earned a spot in my Top Five Alive column.

Their tracks bounce lovelier than Joe Budden's girlfriend on that trampoline (consult YouTube), and they exhibit a flair that distinguishes their cross-continental steeze from that of any other beat team.

Middle Cyclone is her most fearless and arresting record, ruthlessly composed and beautifully recorded.

These 11 tunes deliver both the thematic and the sonic hugeness we expect from U2; you only have to proceed about 80 seconds into the opening title track before the Edge is spraying his trademark guitar sparks everywhere and Bono is observing that infinity is a great place to start.

As you might have guessed, nobody but TSOOL completists (and Mojo subscribers) needs all this stuff. Yet within Communion's overload lurk a handful of neo-Nuggets nuggets.

This may work as a singles record, but it lacks the depth to hold much interest.

Here they make less of an effort to conceal the pop smarts percolating beneath the slop-rock surface; catchy little gems like 'Starting Over' and 'I'll Be with You' help make this the most satisfying Black Lips album yet.

The dry vocal mix leaves her somewhat narrow range exposed. It adds up to an unsatisfying whole.

Like the most artistically successful EPs (Magical Mystery Tour, the Who's surf-rockers, the Beta Band's glory-days output), these do the job without overstaying their welcomes.

Produced by the late Jerry Finn, the album is a slice of American rock radio, polished, compressed, and routinely combustible.

Texas's Trail of Dead settle into a nice groove somewhere between the two on their sixth album.

Hush quells qualms with the relaxed assurance every third album should carry.

The beats are eminently funky, the rhymes tight, and the topics decidedly old-school: plain-spoken boasts, the rejection of greed, and an acknowledgment of our communal evolution indicate the overall tone.

The disparate riff-based writing can be too heavy on cue cards and too light on connecting the ideas, but it's that same friction that makes the band worth listening to.

Their new project has much of the same visceral energy of their old gig, but Mi Ami present it in a much more harmonious, affirming manner.

Still blessed with cleverness, tunes, sass, and youth, she generally pulls it off.

For All I Care adds vocalist Wendy Lewis to the line-up of pianist Ethan Iverson, bassist Reid Anderson, and drummer David King, and though it inches the Bad Plus closer to the pop mainstream, it never loses the particular rhythmic and harmonic quirks that have defined them so far.

To Willie could have a lost ballad and a roadhouse jam for variety's sake, but Houck's thoughtful curating makes it more than a fans-only stopgap.

Telefon Tel Aviv have always been the product of two drives (both senses), but on Immolate Yourself, for the first time, the workflows of Cooper and Eustis merge a single, renewed vision. They go a bit poppier than they've ever gone, yet it's also their darkest work.

There's not much fault to find with the music here, however, particularly when she elects to dial down the raw-edged guitar fuzz the Bastards have become known for.