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Absent MySpace/YouTube flash, how does a literary singer/songwriter type like Toth hope to make an impression, especially now that he's abandoned Wooden Wand's freakier folk for smoother tunes?

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While Takka Takka's debut often sounded like Lou Reed in cuddly, McSweeney's-reading drag, their sophomore effort develops an atmospheric, rhythmically sophisticated sound that recalls the late-'70s work of Peter Gabriel and Brian Eno. Crisp guitar melodies weave a delicate latticework with the taut, understated polyrhythms of drummer Conrad Doucette.

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With a vocal style so wide-eyed and winsome that it makes Jack Johnson sound cynical, Matthew Thomas Dillon flirts with earnest disaster on his patchy debut. Indeed, on the thickly orchestrated "Asthmatic" and "Boarding Lounges," he pushes the goopy melodrama over the line.

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The heftiest of Weller's nine solo studio albums, 22 Dreams finds the modfather kneeling humbly at the altar of craft.

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Crushing angst gets a bright, shiny makeover at the hands of this British foursome. Powered by blaring horns reminiscent of vintage ska and soul, Charlie Waller could be Billy Bragg's twitchy offspring, wailing with awesome fervor as he wallows in self-loathing ("No Soul") and turns the simple act of watching the sky into a meditation on doomed romance ("Clouds").

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After three charming EPs, some thought that this band's Queen- meets–Belle and Sebastian songwriting might make for the next Great American Pop Album. Matthew, Mark, Luke & Laura doesn't match the hype, but it's still an ambitious mess of wordy melodies, whistle-along detours, and multipart epics that recall nothing so much as Mansun's schizophrenic '90s Britpop.