Minimal to the point of sounding monumental, this Detroit guitar-drums-voice duo makes the most of its aesthetic choices and the spaces between riffage and the big beat. In fact, the White Stripes sound like arena rock as hand-crafted in the attic. Singer/guitarist Jack White's voice is a singular, evocative combination of punk, metal, blues, and backwoods while his guitar work is grand and banging with just enough lyrical touches of slide and subtle solo work to let you know he means to use the metal-blues riff collisions just so. Drummer Meg White balances out the fretwork and the fretting with methodical, spare, and booming cymbal, bass drum, and snare cracks. In a word, economy (and that goes for both of the players). The Whites' choice of covers is inspired, too. J. White's voice is equally suited to the task of tackling both the desperation of Robert Johnson's "Stop Breakin' Down" and the loneliness of Bob Dylan's "One More Cup of Coffee." Neither are equal to the originals, but they take a distinctive, haunting spin around the turntable nevertheless. All D.I.Y. punk-country-blues-metal singer/songwriting duos should sound this good.© Chris Handyside /TiVo

Mixing the low-key folk-rock of Gravenhurst and PJ Harvey at her least hysterical, Sophie Hunger produced one of the better singer/songwriter albums to grace the European charts -- in this case, Swiss ones -- with 1983. The focus is firmly on the vocals, placed firmly in the forefront of the mix -- they are simply louder than the rest of the music -- but this is a clever producing decision, not the vanity of someone in love with her voice, as it could have been with a lesser performer: Hunger never forgets that she is there to write songs, not preach or show off her vocal cords. And write songs she does -- an impressive variety of them, in fact, from the rocking "Your Personal Religion" with its bluesy guitar in the middle to the quiet acoustics of "Travelogue" and the almost a cappella opener, and with the rest padded out by a quiet but involved mix of electronica beats suggesting a relaxed Massive Attack, guitar picking, sparse piano lines that clean the much-stained name of "cabaret music," and even dashes of brass and plastic synths where appropriate. The best thing about it, though, is that the music is amazingly cohesive but never dull -- Hunger goes for an introspective nighttime mood, sometimes elegiac, sometimes gloomy, and uses whatever tools she can think of to create it, all without wallowing in unnecessary melodrama. Not every cut stands up to the general standard -- the opening song is too quirky, for example, and some of the latter songs struggle for the same emotional impact that earlier tunes produce effortlessly -- but still, 1983 is as fine a brooding session as can be wished for.© Alexey Eremenko /TiVo

Perennial surfer dude/singer/songwriter Jack Johnson lends his voice to the eternally silent Curious George on this collection of "Sing-A-Longs and Lullabies," original material built around the famous monkey and his strange obsession with "the Man with the Yellow Hat." Universal Pictures couldn't have picked a better collaborator for this soundtrack to the Curious George film, as Johnson's easygoing delivery and breezy demeanor match George's silent curiosity to a T. Fellow songwriters Ben Harper, G. Love, and Matt Costa contribute three songs to the predominantly children-oriented affair, while Johnson and band give up an island rendition of the White Stripes' "We're Going to Be Friends," as well as the umpteenth cover of Schoolhouse Rock!'s "Three Is the Magic Number." Heady stuff? Not exactly, but there's not an ounce of pretense to the project, making it a fun, safe bet for kids and a forgettable -- yet not entirely unpleasant -- piece of escapism for adults. © James Christopher Monger /TiVo

Taking their sweet time to bounce back from the indifferent reception to their 2003 reunion Strays, Jane's Addiction reemerges eight years later with The Great Escape Artist, an album that draws a direct connection to the group's murkier, dramatic moments. Part of this return to the mystic could be due to TV on the Radio's Dave Sitek manning bass for the majority of the album, but his artful spaciness is grounded by numerous songwriting collaborations with Guns N' Roses Duff McKagan, thereby offering a tidy encapsulation of Jane's Addiction's yin and yang: whenever they threaten to float too far off into space, they're pulled back to earth by a heavy dose of Sunset Strip sleaze. This tension had urgency in the '80s, now it’s delivered with finesse, enough so that the whole of The Great Escape Artist appears to favor spaciness even when guitars are grinding out metallic grease. Frankly, the shift toward the ethereal is a welcome relief after the clean lines and bright L.A. sun of Strays, an album that emphasized rock over art. Here, the preference is reversed and the group reaps some benefits, often touching upon the dark, boundless exotica of Nothing's Shocking yet managing to avoid desperation; instead of re-creating sounds, they've recaptured the vibe, which is enough to keep The Great Escape Artist absorbing even when it begins to drift.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

While many considered Car Wheels on a Gravel Road and Essence as definitive statements of arrival for Lucinda Williams as a pop star, she "arrived" creatively with her self-titled album in 1988 and opened up a further world of possibilities with Sweet Old World. The latter two records merely cemented a reputation that was well-deserved from the outset, though they admittedly confused some of her earliest fans. World Without Tears is the most immediate, unpolished album she's done since Sweet Old World. In addition, it is simply the bravest, most emotionally wrenching record she's ever issued. It offers unflinching honesty regarding the paradoxes inherent in love as both a necessary force for fulfillment and a destructive one when embraced unconsciously. Fans of her more polished, emotionally yearning material may have a hard time here because there isn't one track -- of 13 -- that isn't right from the gut, ripped open, bleeding, and stripped of metaphors and literary allusions; they're all cut with the fineness of a stiletto slicing through white bone into the heart's blood. World Without Tears is, among other things, predominantly about co-dependent, screwed-up love. It's about relationships that begin seemingly innocently and well-intentioned and become overwhelmingly powerful emotionally and transcendent sexually, until the moment where a fissure happens, baggage gets dumped in the space between lovers, and they turn in on themselves, becoming twisted and destructive -- where souls get scorched and bodies feel the addictive, obsessive need to be touched by a now absent other. The whole experience burns to ashes; it becomes a series of tattoos disguised as scars. The experience is lived through with shattering pain and bewilderment until wrinkled wisdom emerges on the other side. Most of Williams' albums have one song that deals with this theme, but with the exception of a couple of songs, here they all do.Musically, this is the hardest-rocking record she's ever released, though almost half the songs are ballads. Her road band -- on record with her for the first time -- cut this one live from the studio floor adding keyboards and assorted sonic textures later. The energy here just crackles. Sure, there's gorgeous country and folk music here. "Ventura," with its lilting verse and lap steel whining in the background, is a paean to be swallowed up in the ocean of love's embrace. In fact, it's downright prosaic until she gets to the last verse: "Stand in the shower to clean this dirty mess/Give me back my power and drown this unholiness/Lean over the toilet bowl and throw up my confession/Cleanse my soul of this hidden obsession." The melodic frame is still moving, but the tune reverses itself: It's no longer a broken-hearted ballad, but a statement of purpose and survival. "Fruits of My Labor" is a straight-ahead country song. Williams shimmers with her lyric, her want pouring from her mouth like raw dripping honey. Her words are a poetry of want: "I traced your scent through the gloom/Till I found these purple flowers/I was spent, I was soon smelling you for hours...I've been trying to enjoy all the fruits of my labor/I've been cryin' for you boy, but truth is my savior." One can hear the grain of Loretta Lynn's voice, with an intent so pure and unadorned. But the muck and mire of "Righteously," with its open six-string squall, is pure rock. It's an exhortation to a lover that he need not prove his manhood by being aloof, but to "be the man you ought to tenderly/Stand up for me." Doug Pettibone's overdriven, crunching guitar solo quotes both Duane Allman and Jimi Hendrix near the end of the tune. "Real Live Bleeding Fingers and Broken Guitar Strings" is a Rolling Stones-style country-rocker with a lyric so poignant it need not be quoted here. "Over Time," a tome about getting through the heartbreak of a ruined relationship, could have been produced by Daniel Lanois with its warm guitar tremolo and sweet, pure, haunting vocal in front of the mix. "Those Three Days" may be the most devastating song on the record, with its whimpering lap steel and Williams' half-spoken vocal that questions whether a torrid three-day affair was a lie, a symbolic sacrifice, or the real thing. The protagonist's vulnerability is radical; she feels used, abused -- "Did you only want me for those three days/Did you only need me for those three days/Did you love me forever just for those three days." Yet she holds out hope that there is some other explanation as the questions begin to ask themselves from the depth of a scorched heart and a body touched by something so powerful it feels as if it no longer owns itself. Pettibone's solo screams and rings in the bridge to underline every syllable and emotion. "Atonement" is something else altogether; it's a punkish kind of blues. If the White Stripes jammed with 20 Miles in a big studio it might sound like this, with Williams singing from the depths of a tunnel for a supreme megaphone effect. She growls and shouts and spits her lyrics from the center of the mix. And Taras Prodaniuk's fuzzed-out basement-level gutter bass is the dirtiest, raunchiest thing on record since early Black Sabbath. "Sweet Side" is almost a poem in song, attempts to inspire someone who's been broken by life to accept his goodness. It is not a rap song despite what's been written about it so far. It's more in the tradition of Bob Dylan's early talking blues, but with a modern organic rhythm played by Jim Christie instead of drum loops. In addition, there is the gorgeously tough "People Talking," the most straight-ahead country song Williams has written since "Still I Long for Your Kiss" (from the Horse Whisperer soundtrack, not the version that appears on Car Wheels, which is dull and lifeless by comparison). Here again, Pettibone's guitar and the slippery, skittering shuffle of Christie's drumming carry Williams' voice to a place where she can sing her protagonist's personal, soul-searing truth without restraint.World Without Tears is a work of art in the Henry James sense; it is "that which can never be repeated." It is as fine an album as she could make at this point in her life -- which is saying plenty. While she has never strayed from her own vision and has made few compromises, this album risks everything she's built up to now. The audience she's won over time -- especially with her last two records -- may find it over the top, which would be too damn bad; it'd be their loss. Hopefully, history will prove that World Without Tears sets a new watermark for Williams, and is an album so thoroughly ahead of its time in the way it embraces, and even flaunts, love's contradictions and paradoxes -- the same way the human heart does.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

"'Blue Trash' is a smug response to bluegrass traditionalists and a real stomper."© TiVo

After the release of Feel Good Lost, Broken Social Scene became a bit more collective, swelling from two members to ten (plus guests) and dropping their ambient instrumental approach in favor of full-blown rock songs. As you'd expect with such a dramatic rise in membership, there's a lot more variety this time out. The first two tracks mirror the band's transformation perfectly; in fact, the first is a fairly airy instrumental number with a Mark Isham-like feel, while the second slams it off the rails with a driving beat and wailing guitars. Main members Brendan Canning and Kevin Drew even sing this time around, while Leslie Feist and Emily Haines -- both of whom became Canadian stars after this release, which effectively fueled interest in Feist's solo albums and Haines' work with Metric -- assume lead vocals on other tracks. According to one of the members of this incarnation of the group, trying to determine "who did what" on this album would warrant an entire review in itself, as everyone took turns playing different instruments and the whole project was built from the ground up in a very collective fashion. Listeners who prefer the ambient pop of Feel Good Lost may be put off by the all-over-the-map approach, but You Forgot It in People is a more accessible release overall, and it helped set the stage for Broken Social Scene's international breakthrough in 2005.© Sean Carruthers /TiVo

Live at the Grand Olympic Auditorium documents the last two shows from Rage Against the Machine, recorded in September 2000 for a planned November release, but canceled when the band broke up, and postponed for the second time one year later after three-fourths of the band formed Audioslave with Chris Cornell. The finished product isn't a very good look at one of the finest metal bands of the '90s, not because the performance quality is lacking but because of mixing problems and the simple problems inherent in transferring the energy of a live concert to record. Featuring highlights from the two shows, recorded September 12th and 13th, this delayed version of Live at the Grand Olympic Auditorium also downplays the cover material that comprised the band's last studio album, Renegades, which is a good thing for the fans who agree that Rage performed better with originals than covers. Early on, the band storms through three of its career highlights -- "Killing in the Name," "Bulls on Parade," and "Bullet in the Head" -- with intense performances that capture its combination of heavy metal strut and punk rock disdain. Something is lacking here, though. Zack de la Rocha's vocals are too high in the mix, and the band sounds powerful but surprisingly muddy. Tom Morello's ragged guitar work and siren effects occasionally cut through the fog, but the songs here add little to what fans know of the studio albums. The two covers, cut down from five, add little to the concert; Rage's version of the EPMD classic "I'm Housin'" is a misguided attempt at injecting melodramatic tension into an original that was eerie precisely because the vocal was so nonchalant, and MC5's "Kick Out the Jams" is butchered by de la Rocha, whose attempts to sing the song are flubbed badly.© John Bush /TiVo

In 1988, few heavy metal bands were comprised of all black members, and fewer had the talent or know-how to inject different musical forms into their hard rock sound (funk, punk, alternative, jazz, soul, rap) -- but N.Y.C.'s Living Colour proved to be an exception. Unlike nearly all of the era's metal bands, the group's music has held up over time, thanks to its originality and execution. Living Colour leader/guitarist Vernon Reid spent years honing his six-string chops, and was one of the most respected guitarists in New York's underground scene. He couldn't have done a better job selecting members for his new rock band -- singer Corey Glover, bassist Muzz Skillings, and drummer Will Calhoun -- as their now-classic debut, Vivid, proves. Though the album was released in mid-1988, it picked up steam slowly, exploding at the year's end with the hit single/MTV anthem "Cult of Personality," which merged an instantly recognizable Reid guitar riff and lyrics that explored the dark side of world leaders past and present (and remains LC's best-known song). The album was also incredibly consistent, as proven by the rocker "Middle Man" (which contains lyrics from a note penned by Glover, in which he pondered suicide), the funky, anti-racist "Funny Vibe," the touching "Open Letter (To a Landlord)," plus the Caribbean rock of "Glamour Boys." Add to it an inspired reading of Talking Heads' "Memories Can't Wait," the Zeppelin-esque "Desperate People," and two complex love songs ("I Want to Know" and "Broken Hearts"), and you have one of the finest hard rock albums of the '80s -- and for that matter, all time.© Greg Prato /TiVo

One of the most assured debut albums of the mid-'80s, and one of the finest pop-soul confections of all time, No Parlez was the record that, following from the stellar success of Paul Young's earliest hits, left him poised to dominate the remainder of the decade like no other vocalist could have. Three singles laid bare all that Young was so eminently capable of. "Wherever I Lay My Hat," a beautifully impassioned take on what was, in all fairness, never one of Marvin Gaye's greatest performances, left mouths hanging open in awe; a meaty revision of Nicky Thomas' "Love of the Common People" proved that the earlier performance was no fluke; and "Come Back and Stay" indicated that the boy wasn't only a great singer, he had access to some great originals as well. Add the idiosyncratic yowling of the so-evocatively-named Fabulous Wealthy Tarts backing singers, jabbing a wealth of seemingly meaningless refrains, yelps and cackles into the gaps around Young's own vocal and, before it was even on the racks, it was clear that No Parlez was going to be an invigorating ride. And still it was capable of shocks. The title track was borrowed from former Slapp Happy art rocker Anthony Moore's "Industrial Drums" (from his Only Choice album) -- scarcely the kind of role model that Young's apparent drive for pop superstardom normally looked towards, while Moore's erstwhile bandmate Dagmar Krause surfaced elsewhere, to layer mystifyingly Euro-flavored vocals over a deeply soulful version of "Love Will Tear Us Apart." Yes, that "Love Will Tear Us Apart," a song still so draped in the martyrdom of Ian Curtis that to even think of revising it was regarded as sacrilege in some quarters. Young did more than that, though, he reinvented it. As a whole, the album does not live up to its greatest moments -- once past that so-superlative "Love of the Common People," side two lags badly as it heads towards the nadir of the closing "Sex." Breathtakingly original in small doses, Laurie Latham's production (and the Wealthy Tarts' keening) both lose their appeal after a while. One cannot help, too, but wish that the regular single mixes of the hits had been replaced by the superlative 12" mixes that accompanied their original release -- "Come Back and Stay," in particular, is up there with any Soft Cell or Frankie extension in the annals of classic 12"s. But though it's not flawless, still No Parlez is fearless and, looking back over Young's entire career (so far), one can only wonder how it all went so wrong? He could have ruled the decade like no other Brit of his age. Instead, the back cover photo simply makes him look like the younger brother of one of the guys who beat him to it. And you can bet Robert Smith wasn't expecting that!© Dave Thompson /TiVo

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City of Broken Dreams is Giovanni Guidi's debut as a headliner for ECM. The 28-year-old pianist led several dates for Japan's Venus and France's Cam Jazz labels, and has appeared on ECM before on Enrico Rava's Tribe (2009) and On the Dance Floor (2012). Guidi wrote all this set's ten compositions. With the pianist backed by American bassist Thomas Morgan and longstanding Brazilian drummer João Lobo, City of Broken Dreams is very different from anything he's issued before. On the title track that opens and closes the date, Guidi uses the most skeletal of folk elements to sketch his melodies, making room for space, resonance, and depth, before he begins to fill them in with lyric chord statements that walk elegantly between the grand melodic Italian jazz piano tradition and the more speculative harmonic considerations of modern creative jazz. By contrast, "Just One More Time" borrows from classical and theater music with knotty rhythmic arpeggios that challenge Lobo as Morgan stridently holds the tightrope between them. "The Way Some People Live" opens almost cautiously, with shimmering upper-register arpeggios laid down gently as Morgan illustrates them with lower-string caresses and occasional chords that lengthen the melody's shadows. Underneath Lobo dances. Midway, Guidi begins to wind inside his own melody and burrow into its timbres and tones, creating tension and mystery with a delicate yet insistent touch. "Late Blue" uses thematic repetition in a seemingly restricted palette that moves along a ledge at once inquisitive and brooding, yet never anything less than lyrical. As he and Morgan move to more abstract terrain, Lobo's cymbal work underscores their exploration, beginning with taps and skitters, but eventually giving way to their darker notions by scraping them to moaning effect. "Ocean View" makes use of modalism and post-bop without ever engaging either fully. Much of the considerable charm of City of Broken Dreams is evidenced by the mastery of musical suggestion this trio commands. They make use of many different forms of music in their approach to jazz, if merely to use their colors, dynamics, and intonations to create something other. This a piano trio album that has plenty and gracefully relies on subtlety to express it.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

Perennial surfer dude/singer/songwriter Jack Johnson lends his voice to the eternally silent Curious George on this collection of "Sing-A-Longs and Lullabies," original material built around the famous monkey and his strange obsession with "the Man with the Yellow Hat." Universal Pictures couldn't have picked a better collaborator for this soundtrack to the Curious George film, as Johnson's easygoing delivery and breezy demeanor match George's silent curiosity to a T. Fellow songwriters Ben Harper, G. Love, and Matt Costa contribute three songs to the predominantly children-oriented affair, while Johnson and band give up an island rendition of the White Stripes' "We're Going to Be Friends," as well as the umpteenth cover of Schoolhouse Rock!'s "Three Is the Magic Number." Heady stuff? Not exactly, but there's not an ounce of pretense to the project, making it a fun, safe bet for kids and a forgettable -- yet not entirely unpleasant -- piece of escapism for adults. © James Christopher Monger /TiVo

It took until 1997 for RCA to get it together and replace their Best of Guy Clark with this package, The Essential Guy Clark. The major differences: almost all of the 20 tracks here were cut by Guy Clark on two separate RCA albums -- Old No. 1 and Texas Cookin' -- although "It's About That Time," and "Good to Love You Lady" have been cut from the latter album. RCA's Best of Guy Clark contained only 16 tracks. In their place is a true Guy Clark rarity: a cover of Townes Van Zandt's "Don't Let the Sunshine Fool You." Secondly, this collection is represented by an adequate set of liner notes that give all the credits and production information. Lastly, with recordings this important, they are given first-rate sound treatment. All of the cuts on this set have been remastered in 20-bit sound from the original source tapes. Therefore, the original versions of tracks like "Rita Ballou," "The Last Gunfighter Ballad," "Desperadoes Waiting for a Train," and "That Old Time Feelin'" along with as many others, sound better here than they do on any import recordings that are known of. The only complaint concerning this LP is using the term "essential" in the title instead of just using straight reissues of the albums as two-fers with their given titles (The Essential Guy Clark is part of a series RCA had going), which makes it confusing for both the fan and the casual listener. Given this, neither of these records are actually out of print, except individually under their own names, which is ridiculous.© Thom Jurek /TiVo