This fine album contains several striking songs (notably “The Dark Is Rising” and “Nite and Fog”), but it suffers in comparison to the artistic breakthrough of its immediate predecessor.

These songs are buoyant and polished, but the lyrics range from bewildering to lame and an afternoon of Schlitz’s voice gets tiresome.

The songs are not as strong overall as on her previous albums, and the tempo neither flags nor picks up over the course of the album.

Ultimately, The Campfire Headphase shows continuity with the duo's previous recordings but fails to replicate the sheer beauty and awe-inspiring quality of past material, sounding at times like the work of very good Boards of Canada copyists.

This disappointing album is infectious and literate, but erratic compositional fortitude and lack of daring is a drag, as each clever step is followed by another clever step.

Unfortunately, attempts to abandon [their] formula offer little evidence that they can excel at anything else.

To their vast credit, even if the songs resemble a greatest hits package of indie rock, each guitar break, each bridge comes alive with experimental toughness.

As music for airports, the album hums along like a tension-age sedative, but if it was meant to be a grand artistic statement by an acclaimed band with a distinctive vision, it's pretty much static.

The impact is inconsistent but stronger.

This may be a more mature effort, but in places that sound is ordinary and unadventurous.

Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes is diverting, short (47 minutes), atmospheric and contains exactly one truly memorable song.

Hints at future sonic depths: swirling patterns, impressive musicianship and ambitious ideologies.

Sexsmith is incapable of dishonesty, insincerity or cliché in his writing or performance, but none of these melodies soar and the lyrics reveal nothing new for him.

Solid and diverse if slightly lacking the gorgeous full- bodied melodies of its predecessor.

X&Y is well crafted and enjoyable, but it’s bloodless and distant. It feels manufactured, a piece of product in the march to become the Biggest Band in the World.

There's nothing about the quintet's second album that audibly acknowledges the impact of its debut.

The harder U2 tries to rock out with wild abandon here, the less spontaneous they end up sounding, making How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb more like an incredible simulation of a punk-influenced album rather than an actual punk-influenced album.

More time spent in the songwriting lab might have yielded material more suitable to the evident studio effort invested and brought Wilco closer to making a truly great album.

Even for a debut album, it’s too tentative and timid for its own good.

A solid enough set from the Around the Sun tour but not particularly revelatory, it’s exactly what one would expect from a late-period R.E.M. live album, with no surprises in performance or setlist.

[The opening] quartet of tunes blows the band's wad, leaving the rest of the album scattered with only moderately cool mid- tempo metal, all of it delivered with gusto but not enough serious hooks to make anything stand out.

AwCmon is the stronger of the two, with a trio of outstanding instrumentals acting as the backbone for a suite of typically moody songs.

The dolorous and enervated West reins in some (not all) of Williams' willful stylistic misadventures while holding fast to her golden triumvirate of death, love and longing.

When it pays off -- which is more often than not -- BRMC's fuzzed- out angry shoegazer stance reaches levels of sonic brilliance unmatched by any of their peers.

The song selection is choice, and his band handles the solo material well enough (especially on “I Have Forgiven Jesus” and a showstopping “You Know I Couldn’t Last”), but a smattering of Smiths oldies doesn't help.

NoYouCmon is more eclectic and less focused, with fine moments to be found.

Their worst album so far.... Too much of the album ("Expecting," "Aluminum," "I Can't Wait," "I Can Learn") wallows in an odd, crusty hard-rock haze.

The French Kicks have changed dramatically and not always for the better.