In many ways, All Eternals Deck, his greatest work since 2005's The Sunset Tree, is the perfect final album, fixated on death, legacy, survival, and an uncertain future.

This music is uncharted, revelatory, blossoming, and all the more so, because somehow it feels like it might be to Foster as well.

Its (mostly) gimmick-free, clear-eyed dreamer propulsion will buoy you. But if, like me, you're looking for something a little deeper in an instrumental rock record and you don't unrestrainedly sanctify this band, you may want to hold out till the next Do Make Say Think album.

Although Mudhoney aren’t shaking things up too much with their established formula, The Lucky Ones shows no signs of the band mellowing out, and their bloozy, fuzzy rock action still sounds pretty damn great after a couple High Lifes.

The results of this experiment are not blasphemous by any means, but they have clearly lifted their collective leg to the fire hydrant of their former selves, in favor of cleaner and hipper pop.

Ghil is an album that’s shaped by ideas, but driven by a sound that’s often disengaged.

The Far Field is carried by light catharsis, diffused and mild-tempered fun, virtuosic vocal delivery, and steel-clean production.

Death Lust expands post-hardcore and its asphyxiating spatializations, giving the genre and the sweaty people in it room to breathe. Reinvigorated by this pneumatic procedure, respiration transpires: Chastity’s pulmonary labor sets the stifling structures of headphone listening alight, giving us light and letting us (mired in the heavy) feel light.

For now, Flood Network shows the growing pains of acclaim, responding with a thoughtful ebb, a skim across the sand before the flood.

It’s as if the music has already presented itself. But it hasn’t. Titles can’t describe timbres or structures: they can only point to them.

Indeed, Annie’s given us a few winning singles but also a lot of glitz that can probably be ignored after one listen or two.

This new one is no less heady and singular, and even if it doesn’t do much to advance Jenkins’s captivating line in brain-hop, it solidifies his reputation as one of the most intriguing Wise Guy critics of the “thug life” still branding far too many rappers today.

[A] near-masterpiece.

The remarkable change here comes from courtesy of the record's sonic qualities.

This is an awesome, magnificent, incandescent, trailblazing record.

RELATIONSHIP OF COMMAND IS THE GREATEST ROCK ALBUM I HAVE HEARD IN THE LAST TEN YEARS.

While Vanderslice's consummate production creates several indelible pieces of music, the stark repetition of John Darnielle's songs seems all the more apparent on his full-band numbers.

Because they sound so assured in this sound and its deviations, and because they carry ideas to exciting ends, I want to believe.

With this strangely juvenile rush of an album, Wire have simultaneously honored and eroded the legacy of Pink Flag.

Even at her poppiest here, this is still chunky, dissonant, and dense.

Take Fountain... does little to expand on the formulaic offerings their followers have released. Instead, the album risks running itself into a dead end it creates, all on its own.

If you're a sugar-pop junkie or a [Architecture In] Helsinki-lover, check this one out.

This is a bloated, overlong rock record that shouldn’t have even considered breaking the 40-minute mark.

Another quixotic, cerebral, and indispensable album from one of Canada’s great talents.

God Save the Clientele is more of the same for the group’s fans, who will find the record near-faultless.

North Start Deserter, however, is in a class of its own.

The Kadanes have released their third full-length, a self-titled release best appreciated as the culmination of the Kadane’s experience of playing together since children in Wichita Falls, TX.

While Pfeffer’s lyrics are engaging, they’re sometimes inaccessible in delivery. Despite this, So Embarrassing is an interesting personal take on prog rock’s roots, and therefore quite a step in the right direction.