Crosseyed Heart finds Richards leaning on genre exercises, some of which are more successful than others.
On their eighth album, the band encapsulates a broader purview of Memphis’s influence than ever before.
The album is the strongest affirmation yet of Dan Bejar’s inexhaustible restlessness.
Star Wars is by far the noisiest and most adventurous Wilco album in over a decade.
The album retains Southeastern’s intimate acoustic-based feel and heavyhearted lyrical matter.
Though it lacks the career-spanning sprawl, Ten Songs from Live at Carnegie Hall still captures the essence of the full version of the album.
Sun Kil Moon’s Universal Themes is like a diary with pages that are still blank and need to be filled up.
My Morning Jacket’s forays into synth-heavy prog and arena rock on The Waterfall are alternately inventive and bafflingly blockheaded.
For better or worse, Zac Brown Band refuses to continue churning out the same old formula on Jekyll + Hyde.
Sound & Color is proof that Alabama Shakes have got the chops to be a lot more than Muscle Shoals revivalists.
With its chintzy synths, plastic horns, and feather-lite reggae and lifeless white-guy funk, the album might as well be made up of outtakes recorded 30 years ago.
Given the songwriting chops Butler flashes here, there’s no explanation as to why he’s never gotten to sing a single song with Arcade Fire.
McMurtry steps back from the opener’s heady storytelling style for the remainder of the album’s first half, adopting a more personal mode.
The Decemberists’ new album, What a Terrible World, What a Beautiful World, is built on a series of wild stylistic vacillations.
Although the 13 songs on Classics were written between 1930 and 1974, very few of them are old-fashioned time warps.
Alpha Mike Foxtrot presents a comprehensive survey of Wilco’s long, strange evolution.
Storytone introduces the world to Neil Young the crooner, which is probably not a side of him anyone thought they ever needed to hear.
The covers on With a Little Help from My Fwends tend more toward pointless sabotage than creative rearrangement.
The Best Day finds Moore playing energized, accessible guitar rock that retains many elements of Sonic Youth’s inimitable sprawl.
…And Star Power emulates not only the musical styles, but also the loopy concepts of so many classic bands.