Making no egregious concessions to potential new fans, nor to the musical trends of the past decade, Trail of Dead finally sound like a band emerging from a purgatorial state, out from underneath the shadows of their former selves.

Zonoscope is far from an outright failure, just more severe of a backslide than expected.

It all hits you at 78-rpm, and that these guys have the dexterity to recall the unadorned energy of 1977 punk is their greatest asset.

Once again, the limits of music and musicianship are foregrounded in Popp's relentless pursuit of the horizon afforded by a particular disposition of limits: the limits of imagination, of technology, of process, the organic and the inorganic.

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

Kweli still has an ear for beats, and despite some particular low points here, his lyrics were always overshadowed by his flow, which is as sharp as ever.

This album fits into the venerable history of The Ex and will make you want to dig out the old albums, too. History, as the band told us back in 1982, is what's happening now.

Deerhoof are spazzy, but not sloppy, and their execution is as serious as the atomic bomb on the album cover.

Destroyer's new album Kaputt may be one of the most indefensible albums of all time. But it's also a masterpiece.

Content (pronounced like the noun, not the adjective) is, in many ways, a return to form for the group.

The band isn't doing anything that hasn't been done before, but damn if that doesn't seem to matter a lick while listening to the record. It's just too youthful, effervescent, and charming.

While Arcade Dynamics is a major turn for Mondanile, it's aesthetically in line with the trajectory of many modern acts that also hide behind effects and atmosphere as they develop their songwriting chops.

If there's one thing to complain about, it's a lack of focus to each individual track, in deference to sheer joy at the combinations of sounds they're making.

That's what Cape Dory will be for many listeners--a toxic sugar rush full of empty calories.

No, at best, The King Is Dead is a patchwork of genre exercises, giving listeners little more than a chance to play "spot the influence." But even then it fails, for it taps only a very shallow stream of tradition, focusing on a series of folk facsimiles from the 70s and 80s that never quite add up to the real thing.

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

For the consummate BSP fan, Valhalla Dancehall will likely be met as a sufficient new entry in the band's growing discography, but for a fella like me on the periphery, I'll need a lot more of the standout experimentation of Living Is So Easy to convince me.

Outside tastes like having returned to my favorite bar to find they've redone the menu. Only this time, all the improvements are positive ones.

In the end, the artificial pop of The Promise makes it, as a whole, a more realistic album.

Ghost has had his share of ups and downs, but Apollo Kids finds him back near the top.

How to Dress Well has most often been described as a distorted take on R&B, and I suppose that's most accurate, too. Love Remains substantiates the hearsay with slow, soulful requiems that begin to feel like lovingly sculpted effigies of some of the genre's more immortal catalysts.

At first listen, Tidings seemed more varied and adventurous than Steeple does. It had moments that hinted at pentatonic scales, exotic tastes of other worlds only compounded by the record's almost utter lack of focus.

These songs, nearly half a century old, are as relevant as ever. They should have never been hawked to commercial singers, but delivered as broadsides to the public or as protest music to audiences (as many of them were). Active, agitated citizens should be the recipients of these songs.

So, it's formulaic, it's 'retro' in a really kitschy way, and Business Casual sounds pretty much the same as their 2004 debut, Fancy Footwork; and still, Chromeo are fucking great.

It turns out he's simply not the Nerd Messiah; he's creative and emotional and gifted, but at least right now, he'd do better making rap songs rather than ambient soundscapes.

The Moondoggies make: music for middle-class, middle-aged white liberals. Music for my parents, and the parents of pretty much everyone I know. Tidelands is almost just as good as the real thing, but the real thing is still out there, if I want to find it.

It's a solid reminder that it's tough to grow your rock up, but worth working toward, and Fantastic Explanations is a solid record demonstrating the results.

For those smitten with the notion of the dark, mysterious West and its expanding, crushing, absorbing, destructive, albeit beautiful tendencies, there's much to enjoy on Ancestral Star.