To the band’s credit, the album does warm-up to the listener with consecutive listens, but Blitzen Trapper will have to play some reputable live shows in order to distinguish themselves from the indie rock masses.

Brightblack Morning Light retain a signature, singular, salient sound and still refuse to nudge their songs forward at anything but a crawling pace.

Earth Junk’s parts are greater than their sum.

Albarn’s thirst for musical adventure is commendable, but unless you’re obsessed with his every move or have been dreaming of the day a former Brit pop king fuses the sensibilities of Eastern opera and Western pop, Monkey just doesn’t warrant your full attention.

The album’s an impressive document of Barrett’s talent, but I don’t hear the hooks that similar acts like Belle & Sebastian built their name on. Without them, The Pica Beats remain an also-ran.

It’s not an incredibly remarkable record, but when a band is this consistent for this long, it’s hard to fault it.

Paperwork is a definite step forward, and though it’s possible that those who loved volcano! before might find this more "conventional" album less exciting, I’d be surprised if anyone called it less rewarding.

Eyes At Half Mast seems to be, on one level, an exploration of the horizons of the style of music that Talkdemonic themselves invented, but a lot of it retraces steps already taken, albeit with a noticeable upping of the proverbial ante as far as energy goes.

It’s a trippy album, but it doesn’t trip into too many psych clichés, or perhaps it has fooled me simply by tumbling into all of them.

Freedomland is frustrating because it documents possibly compelling works by a band whose performances captured here were probably compelling, too. It just doesn’t reach the standards of prior work, so I’ll just keep waiting for their next studio album.

Carried to Dust is a fine entry Calexico’s discography that both evokes a much-loved sound from the past and yet looks at the sun fading into the west, turns its horse towards the dying light, and carries on into the future.

Though Sheff’s lyrics can be too earnest sometimes, there’s no doubt he’s one of the most exciting songwriters of recent years, and The Stand Ins is another fine entry in the band’s discography.

This is what ultimately makes Alphabutt a top-notch kids record: that it was recorded by a woman so in love with her kid and with being a mother that you’d happily let her babysit for your wonderful little creature.

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.

If the songs weren’t quality, it would be easy to write these guys off, but the tunes on Living on the Other Side are enough to make me consider charging a few tanks of gas to the credit card and seeing the ocean. And that’s saying something.

If you like gorgeous folk, then this album is for you. If you don’t, well, The Hold Steady released something not that long ago.

What was once shambling and humble and fun has turned into another anonymous, swaggering, guitar-driven indie rock act.

Maybe Now or Heaven isn’t an awful record, but it’s certainly one that strips away everything I felt was compelling about the band to begin with.

Even when the instrumentation oversteps its boundaries, like on the extended rock-out bridge of 'Sheets,' it provides the adequate backbone Jurado’s lyrics need to stand.

Soft Airplane’s basement-recorded mastery is equal parts charming and unnerving, and on the whole singularly spectacular.

All The Way is quite good; let’s hope Growing defy their album’s title and live up to their own name by pursuing their clever ideas even further on their next release.

Wilson continues to rehash southern California culture with increasingly less perspective, further eschewing the untamed adolescent aesthetic by including stuffy musical theater elements and a top-down point-of-view that’s more clumsy analysis than sincere memoir.

The Recession, then, is a portrait of the artist as an over-his-head young man.

Shall Noise Upon succeeds in fits and spurts, but as a whole, it lacks the continuity that is an essential ingredient for a career-defining record.

Though proVISIONS offers some playfully charming moments, ('Can Do,' 'Out There,' 'Increment of Love'), the dark center of this album’s middle is telling.

Youth Novels serves as an entertaining, but ultimately inadequate introduction to Lykke Li.

Chemical Chords is a fine album by Stereolab standards, even if it does nothing to improve upon the band’s by now all-too-familiar sound.

Jaguar Love inject a vicious vitality into their neon-hued rock, and the idea of a dance punk with real fury behind the party is appealing. But in order to avoid being merely irritating or simply diverting, Jaguar Love could benefit from fully unhinging, with an increase in wrath.