1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Login or Register to rate this item.

Sparklehorse's Mark Linkous has spent years subverting his radio-friendly instincts. Although the singer/songwriter's fourth album still buries his twangy hooks and tender voice under distortion-heavy squalls, some eclectic collaborators (Danger Mouse, Tom Waits, a Flaming Lip) help Linkous challenge listeners without scaring them away.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Login or Register to rate this item.

Four fairly interchangeable albums in, Ohio's best guitar-and-drums duo stick with manly sludge blooze your uncle could've rode helmetless to ages ago, neither appreciably better nor worse than the new CD by '70s boogie brontosaurs Cactus. There's some heavy-hearted wailing, a dance number for AC/DC fans, and at least one track that jazzbos might identify as harmolodic.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Login or Register to rate this item.

With his Marvin Gaye tenor, Curtis Mayfield falsetto, and Isaac Hayes dome, the hook-singing OutKast cohort and producer (as a member of Organized Noize) comes on like a lovable, if genetically engineered, soulman on his long-brewing debut. Sleepy's a modest dude, happily playing third string on his own single ("Margarita") behind Big Boi and Pharrell.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Login or Register to rate this item.

Eleven songs recorded in 11 hours by an 11-person pickup band (featuring members of …And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead and My Morning Jacket), The Longest Meow could've been a hipster train wreck. But Bobby Bare Jr. is no ordinary hipster.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Login or Register to rate this item.

"TV Destroy," the best song on the solo debut of Air's Jean-Benoit Dunckel, is a near-perfect confluence of early-'90s indie guitar noise, Daft Punk-style disco, and French-chick-who-can't-say-her-r's vocals, and its three minutes go by way too quickly. But the rest of Darkel is so aceless that it'll make you hanker for Dirty Vegas deep cuts.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Login or Register to rate this item.

There are so many crappy band names in the world, and so many of them belong to metal bands (what's up, Limp Bizkit, Korn, Staind, etc.?), that it feels downright sacrilegious when a band scraps one as good as Burn the Priest. But that's exactly what Richmond, Virginia's Lamb of God did back in 2000.