Love Sign – Free Energy – I love the way Free Energy sound all the time, a modern new wave with dance beats to kill, big guitars, sweet solos, the whole lot, bringing it home. But for all that, the songs aren't there, and really, surely new wave hybrid is more than anything about songs. So I will given them "Backscratcher" and "Electric Fever" and pass onto much of the rest – Grade: B-
Fade – Yo La Tengo – Lessee if I got this right: two of them are married to each other and they fight a lot. And they write a lot about their relationship and it can sound great, a melancholic soundscape that can be an abrasive noisescape. Here, you get an endlessly, it sure does feel endless, for melancholic adults in their late 40s – Grade: B
Beautiful – Teena Marie – Post-humus, and no not on Cash Money Records, if the kick is it is thin on memorable songs, I guess the kicker doesn't listen to much in 2012, and if the kick is Teena's voice is stretched way too thin at the top, I'll live it with. This is the sorta consistent r&b album that doesn't exist any more – Grade: A_
Lost Sirens – New Order – Outtakes are outtakes for a reason and while the quality of these 2005 songs is not negligible, they won't be playing em live two years ago – Grade: B-
Kidz Bop Kids – Kidz Bop 23 – This is the Kidz Bop to miss. It is one thing to take out fucking fucked up bad words out of the mix for children's conception, what it ended up being was a remix with all the gook taken out of big hits . Here the fuck words are left in and so is the gook – Grade: C-
Lysandre – Christopher Owen – The flute on the title take points the way and horns on "New York City" gets you there. But the concept album, our hero has his heart broken on an early Girls tour, feels a little on the light side. And taken out of context, so do some of the songs – Grade: B+
Long Live ASAP Rocky – A$AP Rocky – How many times can we hear the same damn tracks over and over again? If there was only ASAP Rocky fine. Drake was great when he was the only one. But I can point to a dozen albums with the same rhymes to riches stories by depressed rappers. Better than most, true. But man this is a drag – Grade: B-