Coming on the heels of the massive success of the Power Station, Riptide packages Robert Palmer's voice and suave personality into a commercial series of mostly rocking songs that seem custom-tailored to be chart hits. The Power Station connection threatens to overpower Palmer's usually more eclectic musical interest, but with that band's producer/member Bernard Edwards handling production duties and members Andy Taylor and Tony Thompson contributing as well, stylistic similarities were inevitable. "Flesh Wound," though, sounds like a retread of "Some Like It Hot," with its squelching staccato guitars and tribal drums mimicking the hit single. "Hyperactive" adds a bit of a pop veneer to the formula, with its bright keyboards dating the song to the Miami Vice era; that's not to say it doesn't hold nostalgic charm. "Addicted to Love" shares some of the same punch, somewhat slowing down the Power Station's bombast into slinkier, blues territory, while maintaining a heavy rock crunch. The song skyrocketed to the top of the U.S. charts and sold more than a million copies as a single worldwide. A music video for the song, featuring sexy models gyrating blankly, no doubt helped sales and launched a new phase of Palmer's career, where music videos would nearly overshadow his songwriting. Equally catchy and almost as successful is the brilliant take on the Jimmy Jam/Terry Lewis song "I Didn't Mean to Turn You On." It is perhaps Riptide's most daring track, with its fractured jittery notes, funky basslines, and pounding drums matching Palmer's bothered, sweaty vocals to create a yearning song that drips with passion. Also not to be missed is Earl King's "Trick Bag," which Palmer translates into a fun Clues-style minimalist modern blues song. Even if Riptide uses the Power Station as a blueprint, its only true faults reside in the cheesy album-opening and album-closing refrains of "Riptide," which seemingly satisfy Palmer's tropical proclivities. They might be relaxing and humorous as elevator music, but they are sharply at odds with the tone of the album and Palmer's usually impeccable musical taste. Cheesy opening and ending aside, Riptide has some truly addictive moments and it set him firmly on course, for better or worse, for the even harder-rocking Heavy Nova. © Tim DiGravina /TiVo

Shortly after the release of the American Beauty soundtrack -- which featured tantalizing excerpts from Thomas Newman's music bookending a collection of pop songs -- came the release of the full score. From the film's haunting main theme and "Any Other Name" to the witty, percussive "Dead Already," "Choking the Bishop," and "Mr. Smarty Man," Newman's score evokes as much feeling and humor as the film itself does. Even more so than the first volume of the soundtrack, the score from American Beauty is a necessity for the movie's fans.© Heather Phares /TiVo

Considering that the only previous hip-hop hits collection to stretch two full CDs came from 2Pac (and that only after his death), Gang Starr's Full Clip is a surprising release, though it's incredibly welcome. The duo of DJ Premier and Guru has been one of the longest continuous acts on the rap scene, beginning with 1989's No More Mr. Nice Guy and a spot on the soundtrack to Spike Lee's 1990 film Mo' Better Blues. And as demonstrated by Premier's stunning productions on classic early tracks like "Who's Gonna Take the Weight," "Words I Manifest," and "Just to Get a Rep," Gang Starr hit its stride early, and just kept on hitting peak after peak during the '90s with "Speak Ya Clout," "Code of the Streets," "Tonz 'O' Gunz," and "You Know My Steez." And new tracks, usually the bane of any best-of collection, provide quite a few highlights here -- including "Full Clip," "Discipline" (featuring Total), and "All 4 Tha Ca$h." Also, the set compiles several notable B-sides -- "The ? Remainz," "Credit Is Due," and "You Know My Steez (Remix)" -- as well as soundtrack works like "1/2 & 1/2" (from Blade), "Gotta Get Over" (from Trespass), and "The Militia II (Remix)" (from Belly). Though Guru's monotone raps can grate over the course of two hours, Full Clip documents one of the best, most underrated hip-hop groups ever, from their jazzy beginnings into Premier's harder productions from the mid-'90s and beyond.© John Bush /TiVo

If there's one band that truly embodies anti-commercialism, it's Emperor. Generally regarded as the one true master of the Norwegian-bred black metal art form, the band concocts a staggeringly violent whirlwind of carefully constructed noise resulting in nigh-impermeable records piled high with complex arrangements and heart-bursting violence. So it's no surprise that, for its swan song, the band would issue Prometheus, a birth-to-death concept album of such weight and density that it takes roughly two dozen listens to even begin to appreciate the depth of its composition and its painstaking attention to detail. Accompanying the release of Prometheus was the announcement that it would be Emperor's final word as a band, and listening to the record, it is increasingly apparent that the bandmembers were beginning to take divergent musical paths; drummer Trym and guitarist Samoth had started expressing more interest in gut-level power punches, while frontman Ihsahn wished to pursue more cerebral art, evident in his classical project Thou Shalt Suffer, and the strange, progressive output of side band Peccatum. With Trym and Samoth investing the majority of their time in their relatively straightforward, speed-obsessed black/death unit Zyklon, Ihsahn willfully conceived, wrote, and produced the psychologically rigorous record in its entirety, handling all vocals, bass, keyboards, programming, and the majority of guitar tracks himself. Earlier albums were certainly more collaborative, although Ihsahn's influence was always prevalent in Emperor's work. Previous release IX Equilibrium was more immediate and simply arranged, albeit still putting forth the brainy, symphonic battery of much-praised earlier records In the Nightside Eclipse and Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk -- but Prometheus is an altogether different beast that still manages to stay true to the Emperor canon, boasting the group's best production to date with a mix that emphasizes clarity by pushing guitars to the forefront, more carefully integrating the keyboards, and bolstering the flat drum sound that marred previous recordings. In addition, Ihsahn more cogently utilizes his variety of vocalizations, from mid-rangey black-throated screams to King Diamond-esque operatic singing to a deep, echoed spoken tone, all tying tightly into the lyrical story line. Meanwhile, a tangled maelstrom of instrumental madness swirls behind him, the occasional melody or riff leaping out of the storm like a viper striking out from thick brush -- a device that Emperor easily mastered during their career. Middle three tracks "The Prophet," "The Tongue of Fire," and "In the Wordless Chamber" are the album's most prominent manifestos, balancing memorable hooks with molten-hot, broiling ebullience, especially the latter track, which sports a Viking-horn call that rallies the chainmailed troops for battle. "The Eruption" is an apt opening cut, kicking in with a delicately ominous harpsichord intro before bursting with effervescent rage, and "Thorns on My Grave" is a fittingly cold, harsh, and chaotic finale to both Prometheus and Emperor's legacy. Those willing to invest a significant amount of time into Prometheus will be thoroughly rewarded on intellectual and emotional levels -- especially when drawing parallels between the album's elaborate concept and Emperor's musical reign -- while more practical listeners unwilling to slap on headphones and willfully ingest the lyrics will find the record impenetrable. Certainly, In the Nightside Eclipse and Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk will still stand as two of the genre's defining moments, both albums redefining the creative boundaries of black metal in the mid-'90s, but Prometheus should proudly stand beside them, full of sound and fury, signifying a whole hell of a lot: Emperor, being all it can be, plunging the sword into its own breast after winning its most important battle (and possibly the war), willfully doing so before the plague of weakness has a chance to infiltrate its body. No act could be more anti-commercial. © John Serba /TiVo

One of the world's greatest Arnold Schwarzenegger-themed metal bands working today, Austrian Death Machine return with Triple Brutal, an album of aggressive, chest-thumping metalcore that mines its running gag for all it's worth. Continuing to pack the album with over the top riffs and punishing sonic brutality, As I Lay Dying frontman Tim Lambesis delivers a crushing volley of big dumb metal paired with random Arnold appearances. Although the schtick can wear a bit thin at times, musically Triple Brutal is a solid album ready-made for the mosh pit, and those looking to get some cathartic metal that doesn't take itself too seriously, or maybe just a little more of The Governator, into their lives won't be disappointed.© Gregory Heaney /TiVo

Signed to a label (Loud) notorious for its astute thug philosophers (Wu-Tang, Mobb Deep, and Big Pun), Dead Prez's empowering debut, Lets Get Free, seems like a misplaced oddity. Yet the disputatious duo of SticMan and M1 would be an oddity on any label, as they shoulder the burden of revitalizing a genre (problack) which has been seemingly erased from the collective consciousness. Taking social activism to new heights, Dead Prez are the most revolutionary hip-hop group to emerge since Public Enemy lost their audience and N.W.A disbanded. SticMan and M1 chronicle a broad range of politically pressing issues which pertain to the black community -- from the inadequacies of inner-city public schooling ("They Schools") to socially repressive bureaucracies ("Police State"). But Dead Prez are more then just agenda and rhetoric; the group's topical diversity is equally inspiring, seamlessly shifting from the mind-pillaging "Psychology" into the conversational foreplay of "Mind Sex." Yet it is "Animal in Man" that best illustrates just how innovative this group can be.© Matt Conaway /TiVo

Quasimoto's The Unseen is one of the most imaginative albums of the new West Coast underground, a puzzling, psychedelic jazz-rap gem riddled with warped humor and fractured musical genius. Producer Madlib actually outdoes his inventive work on the Lootpack's debut album, Soundpieces: Da Antidote!, crafting deep, dreamy jazz loops littered with found sounds and wiggy vocal samples. Quasimoto's helium-huffing voice is actually Madlib's, electronically altered for an effect not unlike Prince's abandoned Camille project. It might put some listeners off as gimmicky, and it's really a shame if it does, because it isn't really the focal point of The Unseen's left-field brilliance. It's more of an added textural element for Madlib's off-kilter soundscapes and a vehicle for the cartoonish humor hinted at in his choice of samples. The lyrics are highly free-associative (that is to say, stoned beyond belief), and by turns paranoid, threatening, or hallucinatory. But it all melts into the warm, druggy haze of the music; unlike, say, the Wu-Tang Clan or Dr. Octagon, this dream isn't supposed to be a nightmare. Quas' scattershot flow isn't what you'd call technically accomplished, but that's by design -- he's supposed to be fragmented, not quite all there. The song structures are similarly loose, with rhymes coming from nowhere and disappearing just as quickly; the tracks are short (all under four minutes) and end abruptly, as though Quas is too blunted to think of anything else to say. (Madlib does appear as himself on occasion, and usually sounds just as noncommittal as his "collaborator.") Highlights are plentiful, and include the brilliant singles "Microphone Mathematics" and "Come on Feet," the bizarre trash-talking of "Bad Character" and "Put a Curse on You," and the joy-of-music cuts "Return of the Loop Digga" and "Jazz Cats, Pt. 1," which recount Madlib's obsession with record collecting and name-check his favorites. It takes some time to assimilate, but The Unseen gradually reveals itself as one of the most unique and rewarding albums of its era. © Steve Huey /TiVo

"Municipal Waste’s return brings much of what you’d expect from the Richmond rippers. There’s their patented slashing, tight-cornered riffs played at extremely high velocities, with the occasional neck wrenching half time breakdown laced in." © TiVo

Matthew Parmenter writes all the songs, sings, does keys, violin, sax, and orchestra chimes. Jon Preston Bouda is electric and acoustic guitars. Matthew Kennedy is bass, and Paul Dzendzel is drums and percussion. What we have is four long pieces or musical acts each being divided into movements or scenes. We open with "Canto IV," superbly, forcefully launched with a determined, I've-got-something-to-say-angst attitude. It stomps over you with that Led Zeppelin "Kashmir" progression. At times you can hear Traffic when Parmenter's sax slips in, and a lot of Kansas washing over you. Parmenter's vocals are compelling and strong, and you are gripped quickly. He even uses a modified howling late in the CD, calling to mind Warren Zevon's "Werewolves of London." It is not overdone in the slightest. Guitars are on the precision level of Crack the Sky and Wishbone Ash, but expressive in the vein of Pete Townshend or Brian May. Parmenter's vocal dramatics and dynamics approach Freddie Mercury, yet hover around that Alan Parsons Project, Tales of Mystery and Imagination macabre tone. You can hear that Echolyn well-wound watch timing and crispness throughout. When the mellotrons go awailing, you are instantly transported into vintage Crimson-space revelry. The lyrics are a disturbing, dark descent into some poor soul's miasma of confused regrets. Parmenter is a 20th century Dante. Angst, introspection, and fever-dreamed psychobabble relentlessly pummel your brain into ashes and bones.Parmenter has peered into the Cosmic Egg's Crack. What he relates is far from pleasant. Herein resides epic prog rock, full of passion and pain. Unfolded Like Staircase is a dark monolith casting a very long, imposing shadow across the barren wastes of this thing we call reality. Somberly recommended. © John W. Patterson /TiVo

Coming on the heels of the massive success of the Power Station, Riptide packages Robert Palmer's voice and suave personality into a commercial series of mostly rocking songs that seem custom-tailored to be chart hits. The Power Station connection threatens to overpower Palmer's usually more eclectic musical interest, but with that band's producer/member Bernard Edwards handling production duties and members Andy Taylor and Tony Thompson contributing as well, stylistic similarities were inevitable. "Flesh Wound," though, sounds like a retread of "Some Like It Hot," with its squelching staccato guitars and tribal drums mimicking the hit single. "Hyperactive" adds a bit of a pop veneer to the formula, with its bright keyboards dating the song to the Miami Vice era; that's not to say it doesn't hold nostalgic charm. "Addicted to Love" shares some of the same punch, somewhat slowing down the Power Station's bombast into slinkier, blues territory, while maintaining a heavy rock crunch. The song skyrocketed to the top of the U.S. charts and sold more than a million copies as a single worldwide. A music video for the song, featuring sexy models gyrating blankly, no doubt helped sales and launched a new phase of Palmer's career, where music videos would nearly overshadow his songwriting. Equally catchy and almost as successful is the brilliant take on the Jimmy Jam/Terry Lewis song "I Didn't Mean to Turn You On." It is perhaps Riptide's most daring track, with its fractured jittery notes, funky basslines, and pounding drums matching Palmer's bothered, sweaty vocals to create a yearning song that drips with passion. Also not to be missed is Earl King's "Trick Bag," which Palmer translates into a fun Clues-style minimalist modern blues song. Even if Riptide uses the Power Station as a blueprint, its only true faults reside in the cheesy album-opening and album-closing refrains of "Riptide," which seemingly satisfy Palmer's tropical proclivities. They might be relaxing and humorous as elevator music, but they are sharply at odds with the tone of the album and Palmer's usually impeccable musical taste. Cheesy opening and ending aside, Riptide has some truly addictive moments and it set him firmly on course, for better or worse, for the even harder-rocking Heavy Nova. © Tim DiGravina /TiVo

Biohazard's Urban Discipline introduced the band's one-of-a-kind, Brooklyn thrash-rap sound to hardcore fans outside the five boroughs. It's an authentic mix of inner-city vocal rhythms with metal's take-no-prisoners attitude, one that granted them international credibility. Urban Discipline is an original hardcore metal-rap album, debuting a half-decade prior to the rap-rock explosion of the late '90s. It is defiant and distinctive -- in some senses a precursor of bands such as Korn, Limp Bizkit, and the Deftones, and in other ways in a class all its own. It's not the self-indulgent, "I-gotta-get-mine" rap-rock of the late '90s, as it's loaded with social criticism. It's a blue-collar metal record made by rough-shod, tattooed, fighting men. The album's highlight is "Punishment," a hard-charging anthem with a surprisingly melodic chorus. This hook was strong enough to earn them moderate playtime on MTV, even though nothing else sounded like them at the time.Though intended merely as simple music for slam dancing, Biohazard does well to mix things up within those parameters. The group successfully rearranged their typical song structure with divergent bass, drum, and guitar parts in "Shades of Grey." They're technically competent enough to implement light crescendos and decrescendos, tempo variation, and a diffuse focus of the instruments within the band. It's not Mozart, but it is one of the most authentic combinations of thrash and rap ever made.© Kieran McCarthy /TiVo

Space Is the Place provides an excellent introduction to Sun Ra's vast and free-form jazz catalog. Typical of many Sun Ra recordings, the program is varied; earthbound songs, like the swing number "Images" and Egyptian exotica piece "Discipline," fit right in with more space-age cuts, like the tumultuous "Sea of Sounds" and the humorous "Rocket Number Nine." Sun Ra fuses many of these styles on the sprawling title cut, as interlocking harmonies, African percussion, manic synthesizer lines, and joyous ensemble blowing all jell into some sort of church revival of the cosmos. Throughout the recording, Sun Ra displays his typically wide-ranging talents on space organ and piano, reed players John Gilmore and Marshall Allen contribute incisive and intense solos, and June Tyson masterfully leads the Space Ethnic Voices on dreamy vocal flights. This is a fine recording and a must for Sun Ra fans.© Stephen Cook /TiVo

Space Is the Place provides an excellent introduction to Sun Ra's vast and free-form jazz catalog. Typical of many Sun Ra recordings, the program is varied; earthbound songs, like the swing number "Images" and Egyptian exotica piece "Discipline," fit right in with more space-age cuts, like the tumultuous "Sea of Sounds" and the humorous "Rocket Number Nine." Sun Ra fuses many of these styles on the sprawling title cut, as interlocking harmonies, African percussion, manic synthesizer lines, and joyous ensemble blowing all jell into some sort of church revival of the cosmos. Throughout the recording, Sun Ra displays his typically wide-ranging talents on space organ and piano, reed players John Gilmore and Marshall Allen contribute incisive and intense solos, and June Tyson masterfully leads the Space Ethnic Voices on dreamy vocal flights. This is a fine recording and a must for Sun Ra fans.© Stephen Cook /TiVo