The album never quite works as a whole because it doesn’t give a clear indication of what the Punch Brothers are about.
Stronger is an album of hard-won optimism, as even the break-up songs have a sense of humor about them.
Good Time sounds strangely insecure for an artist who continues to draw some seriously heavyweight comparisons.
if it isn’t Tift Merritt’s commercial breakthrough, Another Country is a welcome return.
These songs don’t sound like love songs because they aren’t love songs.
Strange Folk should play well to the diehards who remain from Kula Shaker’s once-sizable fanbase.
Like Shelby Lynne’s Just a Little Lovin’, it owes its successes as much to a clear sense of purpose as to its singer’s exceptional voice.
Flock invites generally favorable comparisons to a host of other exports from the U.K.
Moment of Forever is intended to reassert Willie Nelson’s mainstream relevance.
Here is a definitively modern record, and perhaps the first of Collett’s solo albums to sound like a real classic.
What works so well about Lucky is the interplay between the band’s buoyant arrangements and lyrics that reflect a pronounced anxiety.
The songs here are sure to fulfill their potential in a live show, but Hernando flattens too much of their reverb and distortion.
This is a sporadically brilliant effort by an exceptional band whose reach still sometimes exceeds their grasp.
If the result isn’t a classic like Dusty in Memphis, it’s at least a reminder of why Lynne merits those comparisons at all.
Angels of Destruction! too often smothers its solid roots-rock foundation in strident overproduction.
The latest album from Rhonda Vincent and her stellar backing band, the Rage, finds the bluegrass star aiming for a more mainstream country sound.
The Steeldrivers stands as one of the most accomplished and certainly one of the most distinctive bluegrass debuts in recent memory.
For a collection of lo-fi home demos, Rivers Cuomo’s Alone, in its better moments, sure does sound at times like a return to form.
That Ritter has made what is arguably a better record song-for-song than any that Bob Dylan has released this decade isn’t a backhanded compliment.
Aesop’s indomitable presence and knotty co-production make what he says incidental to how he says it.