They accomplish what most rock bands only dream of: the subtle transcendence of genre, form, and the music itself.

It's just another above average release from another indie band.

Couples proves that Kate is no Jarvis, and, more importantly, The Long Blondes are no Pulp.

While the elders will rejoice this sober, satisfied, and craftily subdued effort, the younglings of the bunch, with their abbreviated attention spans, iPod shuffles, and demand for instant gratification, will declare the album a boring and lethargic affair.

Devotion has that same opiated warmth that left me lying in a bed of rose petals for long stretches last year, and though I would have preferred a bigger growth spurt from the Baltimore duo, they shot up at least enough to warrant a new pencil mark a half-inch/inch above where I placed them in ‘06.

Off to Business--released eponymously by Guided By Voices, Inc.--is the ultimate product of this trend: an album full of ebullient mid-tempo rockers, ebullient pretty guitar parts, and ebullient power drum fills.

It takes its time in becoming a thing of familiarity and character, far from rushing to win you over.

8 Diagrams is a paradox of track selection and pacing.

[A] wondrous debut record.

Alex G’s first major wax-plated step outside the bedroom is predictably secure. But it’s also exploratory of his changing landscape, one that’s situated like unauthorized speech-class notecards, articulating each situation and character but still allowing for cracks and incongruity.

It's hard to see Medicine County winning her any new fans, but for existing ones it's a welcome release that shows her moving further into Americana (more in the old school sense, but, sure, in the No Depression sense, too.)

[The songs] may be executed with prowess, but their bandied crassness isn't just a tried-and-true style, it's a tiresome cliché.

It certainly avoids the epic-lite quality we usually associate with bands in the post-rock mold. There’s no soundtrack material here: nothing to be exploited for the purposes of perfume advertisement erotica or inspiring nature documentaries.

This is probably the best album we've seen in the new millennium from a mid-'90s techno producer.

It’s one of those beguiling albums saved for times alone, times when nothing else would seem quite right.

Magik Markers seemingly forget their own warnings and regain their former wily intransigence, ending the album with a threesome of songs that return them to sonically murky territory, as if suddenly realizing that in fact they’d been trying to uncover something in this murk rather than striving to bury themselves in it.

The result is an album that feels more like a compilation than a true collaboration.

There are very few metaphors for the limitlessness of human creativity and ingenuity as powerful as that provided by space, and now by Public Service Broadcasting.

Essentially, Haines' piano playing and singing are lovely, but Knives' timidity, coupled with mundane and occasionally outright bad lyrics, keep this record in check.

Every song is serrated with pixel edges, and Alice Glass’ sometimes morose, sometimes lilting like a Valley girl vocals vibrate with such catchy and violent gloom that it’d send any human/marmoset/sentient being into an epileptic dance session.

If Watersports paced itself, if it weren’t afraid to be shorter, if it understood the power of precision, it could have been more awe-inspiring.

Do Whatever You Want All The Time is tepid and uneventful, and proof that the band's previous work didn't succeed solely on its raucousness.

While HEALTH and Get Color were cohesive collections of songs that created a snapshot in time of where the artists were when creating them, listening to Death Magic feels like we’re seeing not just the band they are currently, but all the bands they could be.

Mankind across as the next step in defining who High Places are, instead of the sort of developmental stopgap that makes us wonder why we ever believed internet hype in the first place.

In lieu of messing around in the dark fringes of slightly bizarre café music, Free The Bees is a straight up rock album more in line with Iron Butterfly and the Small Faces than Morcheeba or Quantic.

With twice as much content as usual and Numbers working out their heaviest dose of lo-fi drone rock, this is their best release to date.

The rich, roomy tonal fidelity on display is a big part of what makes Angel click.

On Tomorrow’s Hits, we place our hands against the walls, we feel the familiar texture of recording studio foam, we lift ourselves up gently only to drop back down to the ground, actions of a bored child.