Early on in Save Rock and Roll, Patrick Stump sings he'll change you like a remix then raise you like a phoenix, words written, as always, by Pete Wentz, and sentiments that place this 2013 Fall Out Boy comeback in some kind of perspective. After the absurdly ambitious 2008 LP Folie à Deux, the band expanded and imploded, winding up in a pseudo-retirement where Stump released an inspired but confused solo record while Wentz pursued Black Cards, a band that went nowhere. Failure has a way of reuniting wayward souls, and so Stump, Wentz, Joe Trohman, and Andy Hurley all settled their differences and cut Save Rock and Roll, an album that acts like Fall Out Boy never went away while simultaneously acknowledging every trend of the last five years. Alone among their peers, Fall Out Boy are always acutely conscious of what's on the charts, not limiting themselves to the brickwalled blast of modern rock but also dipping into the crystalline shimmer of R&B and even sending up the folk stomp of Mumford & Sons on "Young Volcanoes." One of great things about Fall Out Boy -- the thing that's infuriating and intoxicating in equal measure -- is that it's difficult to discern where their sincerity ends and their parody begins. That's particularly true of Save Rock and Roll, where the group is negotiating its rapidly approaching maturity along with the fashions of the time. They're not entirely successful, partially because they rely on their trusty emo onslaught of unmodulated chords and emotions, partially because there still is a lingering suspicion that they may not truly believe anything they sing. Nevertheless, they're ambitious, admirable, and sometimes thrilling, particularly because the group never fears to tread into treacherous waters, happy to blur the distinctions between pop and rock, mainstream and underground. They bring in Courtney Love to snarl like it's 1993, they have Elton John act like the grand dame he is, but neither overshadows the group's intoxicatingly smeary stance on what rock & roll is. They're not traditionalists -- they're not about three chords and the truth, they're about misdirection and hiding their emotions, then letting it all spill out in one headstrong rush. In 2013, when so many bands are donning tweed caps and pining for a past that never existed, it's kind of fun to have a band tackle the modern world in all its mess as Fall Out Boy do here.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

Early on in Save Rock and Roll, Patrick Stump sings he'll change you like a remix then raise you like a phoenix, words written, as always, by Pete Wentz, and sentiments that place this 2013 Fall Out Boy comeback in some kind of perspective. After the absurdly ambitious 2008 LP Folie à Deux, the band expanded and imploded, winding up in a pseudo-retirement where Stump released an inspired but confused solo record while Wentz pursued Black Cards, a band that went nowhere. Failure has a way of reuniting wayward souls, and so Stump, Wentz, Joe Trohman, and Andy Hurley all settled their differences and cut Save Rock and Roll, an album that acts like Fall Out Boy never went away while simultaneously acknowledging every trend of the last five years. Alone among their peers, Fall Out Boy are always acutely conscious of what's on the charts, not limiting themselves to the brickwalled blast of modern rock but also dipping into the crystalline shimmer of R&B and even sending up the folk stomp of Mumford & Sons on "Young Volcanoes." One of great things about Fall Out Boy -- the thing that's infuriating and intoxicating in equal measure -- is that it's difficult to discern where their sincerity ends and their parody begins. That's particularly true of Save Rock and Roll, where the group is negotiating its rapidly approaching maturity along with the fashions of the time. They're not entirely successful, partially because they rely on their trusty emo onslaught of unmodulated chords and emotions, partially because there still is a lingering suspicion that they may not truly believe anything they sing. Nevertheless, they're ambitious, admirable, and sometimes thrilling, particularly because the group never fears to tread into treacherous waters, happy to blur the distinctions between pop and rock, mainstream and underground. They bring in Courtney Love to snarl like it's 1993, they have Elton John act like the grand dame he is, but neither overshadows the group's intoxicatingly smeary stance on what rock & roll is. They're not traditionalists -- they're not about three chords and the truth, they're about misdirection and hiding their emotions, then letting it all spill out in one headstrong rush. In 2013, when so many bands are donning tweed caps and pining for a past that never existed, it's kind of fun to have a band tackle the modern world in all its mess as Fall Out Boy do here.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

This strong debut benefits greatly from the expertise of veteran producer Bruce Botnick as well as the likes of former Steve Miller bassist Lonnie Turner and saxman Tom Scott. Guitarist Jimmy Lyon was to Money what Keith Scott was to Bryan Adams. Money, son of a New York City cop, had a rock & roll epiphany en route to following his dad's career path. The debut album, long on craft but not without inspiration, deservedly shot radio-ready tunes "Two Tickets to Paradise" and "Baby Hold On" up the charts, the latter helped by former Elvin Bishop songmate Jo Baker. The key tune is the spirited "Wanna Be a Rock 'n' Roll Star," which spells out the game plan.© Mark Allan /TiVo

When first approaching The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle, it's best not to think of it as a Sex Pistols album; rather, keep in mind that it's the soundtrack to a movie that was mostly about Malcolm McLaren and only tangentially concerned the great band he managed. Only eight of the twenty-four songs on The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle feature the same band as on Never Mind the Bollocks, and most of those capture them stomping through covers in the studio, sometimes to impressive effect (Johnny Rotten sounds positively feral on the Who's "Substitute" and the whole band tears into "(I'm Not Your) Stepping Stone" with malicious glee) and sometimes not (Rotten reveals he doesn't know the words to either Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode" or Jonathan Richman's "Roadrunner," and the band's familiarity isn't much greater). A live take of the Pistols roaring through "Belsen Was a Gas" is exciting, but sounds as if Rotten and the rest of the band were traveling in very different directions, and it's not hard to imagine why he quit the group after the show. Steve Jones and Paul Cook offer up a few tunes of their own, which lack the danger of the cuts with Rotten but confirm they were the backbone of a solid, scrappy rock band, and if Tenpole Tudor isn't much of a singer, on his numbers he delivers an impressive degree of sheer eccentricity. But a large percentage of the album is devoted to jokey material tied into the movie -- orchestral versions of "EMI" and "God Save the Queen," a French busker performing "Anarchy in the UK" en Français, train robber Ronnie Biggs attempting to sing, and Malcolm McLaren ascending to show biz heaven with a cover of Max Bygraves' "You Need Hands." And while Sid Vicious sounds like a good if unexceptional rock & roll shouter on a pair of Eddie Cochran covers, his inarguably remarkable version of "My Way" shows the man was incapable of comprehending the irony of his situation, and sadly sounds like the work of a kid destined to die young. Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols was the sound of a hydrogen bomb being dropped on your head, and The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle collects some of the debris left after the explosion; parts are brilliant, but it's ultimately a padded and slightly depressing look at a great band in collapse.© Mark Deming /TiVo

Perhaps one of his best-loved albums, Edgar Winter's White Trash combined funk, blues, R&B, and rock & roll to create one of the freshest sounds of the early '70s. Touching on gospel with "Fly Away" and "Save the Planet," Winter and his band cover all the bases, climbing into the lower end of the Top 40 with "Keep Playin' That Rock and Roll." Winter's hauntingly beautiful "Dying to Live," featuring some of his best piano work, serves as a valid anti-war statement, written at the height of the Vietnam era, and the remainder of the record is filled with genuine rock & roll/boogie-woogie/blues that will keep your head bobbing and your toes tapping.© Michael B. Smith /TiVo