The Leeds junglist tells a story in the wrong order, in the right way.
Painted a particularly severe shade of black, Six, despite the season and its sinister atmosphere, is not a Halloween album.
Christmas in the Heart comes off as something of an oddity, a feeling not lessened by the fact that this is a Bob Dylan Christmas album.
Lightning never strikes the same place twice, but Lightning Bolt does.
It’s the enthusiasm of the performances that makes Mind Chaos work, but the fact that it’s always dialed up so high also works against the album.
Exene Cervenka has dabbled in acoustic music since the late ’80s, but Somewhere Gone, her debut for the Bloodshot label, is something of a departure.
Even when the band pulls back for one of their quirky love songs, it’s something of a disaster.
Toby Keith walks a fine line between self-mythologizing and self-parody on his 12th studio album.
Run Rabbit Run illustrates Osso’s mastery of their string instruments but emphasize Stevens’s incredible talent as a songwriter and arranger.
On paper, Backstreet Boys enlisted all of the right people for the third album of their thus-far ineffectual comeback.
Intuit does have acoustic guitars (layers upon layers of them, in fact), but it also has a whole lot more.
Love 2 has the unruffled air of ’50s bachelor-pad cool.
The Mountain Goats’s The Life of the World to Come isn’t the sound of John Darnielle finding religion.
My Way displays all the stubborn ambition that’s kept Brown afloat since John Squire swapped his guitar for watercolors.
With In and Out of Control, the Raveonettes squander an appealing concept.
The soundtrack is a structurally rich effort that matches the tone of Spike Jonze’s images.
Perhaps the only thing working against Brandi Carlile’s commercial prospects is her timing.
If Big Kenny spent a bit less time on drippy, unconvincing romantic ballads, the album would work better as a career re-launch.
Despite the uninspired arrangements of the songs and the banal production choices, Beth Ditto’s gritty, soulful deliveries shine.
At a time when a “Guitar Hero” is something your kid brother picks up at GameStop, Doug Martsch is a pantheon unto himself.
The decade that began with more than a few bangers ends with a whimper for Basement Jaxx.