One would hope that Ghostface could’ve closed out a decade of solid to absolutely classic releases with one more enjoyable listen but the “Back Like That”-styled, deliberately R&B-fueled Wizard of Poetry is weak sauce: the guest stars are b-list at best and while the rhymes are generally strong (this is Ghostface we’re talking about), they have no bite, except for the unquestionable album highlight and stunningly, impressively filthy fuck-jam “Stapleton Sex”. (Which Ghost has dedicated to Natalie Portman, because of course he has)

Rating: 5.5 / 10

September 29, 2009
Def Jam

The second solo outing by Bradford Cox of Deerhunter is a breathtaking expansion on the laptop experiments of his first album and the dozens of songs that can be found on his blog, a wildly diverse collection of songs that range from warm guitar pop (“Criminals”) to bubbly electronics (Noah Lennox collaboration “Walkabout”) and washed out, shoegaze landscapes (the Lætitia Sadier-featuring “Quick Canal”); Logos may be the best example yet of why Cox is one of the most talented songwriters in indie music today.

Logos 1.0: Logos was originally scheduled for release last year, but pesky internet folks discovered that Bradford’s folder on Mediafire was totally open to public access. Demos for the album and the second disc of Deerhunter’s Microcastle were both leaked within hours and Bradford posted an unmastered version of the album on his blog and bitterly declared it dead. It wasn’t until earlier this year that he announced the album would live again, and we can all be thankful that he did.

Rating: 9.3 / 10

October 20, 2009
Kranky/4AD

What’s surprising about the soundtrack for Spike Jonze’ highly anticipated “Where the Wild Things Are” adaptation is just how cohesive it sounds as an album, without the context of the film (one could easily mistake it for a Karen O solo debut): brimming with an undeniably sweet and appropriately child-like energy, sing/shout-along sugar rushes like “All is Love” and “Rumpus” are well tempered by lovely instrumentals and ballads, the delicate “Hidaway” and Karen O’s beautiful rendition of Daniel Johnston’s “Worried Shoes” being big highlights.

Rating: 7.7 / 10

September 29, 2009
DGC/Interscope

Who would have guessed that a band 25 years into an already illustrious career and comfortably ensconced in commercial success and legendary status would take an absolute left turn the way The Flaming Lips do on Embryonic – a double album swimming in boomingly distorted instruments, jam sessions and noise freak outs, stoner philosophizing and minimalist experiments, from rockers like “Convinced of the Hex” and the stomping “Watching the Planets” to unsettlingly eerie tracks like “Evil”, there’s an amazing and satisfying sense of depth and musical experience to be found on Embryonic; thank god, for the first time in many years The Flaming Lips are fucking weird again.

Rating: 9.3 / 10

October 13, 2009
Warner Bros.

Half of The Resistance demonstrates that Muse has “grown up” a little, and the other half – the second half – demonstrates that they really haven’t grown up at all and are still overly concerned with making over-the-top, lush arrangements that are too self-involved for their own good; the band is channeling Queen with more frequency (and doing a better job at it) than before, managing to avoid sounding like a Queen cover band but stuffing all of the audio theatrics that entails.

Rating: 7.1 / 10

September 14, 2009
Warner Bros./Helium 3

20-year-old Londoners The xx seem poised as the next big, stylish act to come out of nowhere and catch everybody’s ear: their simple but highly original sound is composed of basic, New Order style drum machine beats slowed down to a crawl and mixed with dark guitars, deep bass, and hooky, smokey, sexy boy/gir vocals reminiscent of modern R&B (the album’s iTunes bonus track is a cover of an Aaliyah song); history would caution us against putting too much hype into such a band lest they collapse under it’s weight, but xx is a very strong album and one of the most promising debuts of the year.

Rating: 8.5 / 10

October 20, 2009
Young Turks/Rough Trade

Girls’ lead singer has a voice that ranges somewhere between Elvis Costello and Elvis Costello parody, but despite how they might try, Girls don’t have quite the same ability to process and reappropriate pop’s past the way the venerable Mr. Costello does: while songs like “Lust for Life” and “Hellhole Ratrace” are brimming with sunshine and energy, much of the album strikes one as self-consciously derivative – you’ll want to run through Endless Summer afterwards to pick out exactly which Beach Boys melodies they were lifting – resulting in an album that’s inoffensive, enjoyable, and even brilliant at times, but not quite original enough to be truly impressive.

Rating: 6.5 / 10

September 22, 2009
True Panther

The long awaited sequel to what is easily one of the greatest hip-hop albums of all time, Only Built 4 Cuban Linx II delivers about as completely as one could hope for, as evidenced only a few minutes in with the ferocious “House of Flying Daggers” and continually reaffirmed with each track, as Raekwon and a host of Wu-Tang cohorts and guest stars tear through high tension drug narratives atop sweet but undistracting production from the likes of J Dilla, RZA, and many others; while Only Built 4 Cuban Linx II doesn’t sound like a complete throwback, it has the classic energy of Wu-Tang’s best releases, the kind of energy that seems sorely lacking in most hip-hop today.

Rating: 9.3 / 10

September 8, 2009
Icewater Records, EMI

Rating: 8 / 10

September 8, 2009
Lovepump United

On The Blueprint 3‘s first single “D.O.A. (Death of Autotune)”, Jay-Z complains about the state of rap and brags about getting back to real hip-hop, but he spends the rest of the album completely contradicting himself: this sounds like Jay-Z trying his hand at a more pop-oriented album – à la collaborator Kanye West – but Jigga isn’t Kanye and his attempts (aside from most of the album’s first third, particularly second single “Run This Town”) generally fall flat and become immediately forgettable, before the album gets downright terrible with the cheese-tastic closer “Young Forever” and the muddled, disgracefully bad “Hate” (possibly one of the worst songs of the year); The Blueprint 3 is clearly the sound of Jay-Z trying to be something he isn’t.

Rating: 5 / 10

September 11, 2009
Roc Nation

Collective Soul, really, is an adult contemporary band cleverly disguised as a rock band (hey, Chicago could rock out every once in a while too), and their tried and true formula continues on their second self-titled album although once might suggest “tired and true” as any of the songs on this disc could have been lifted from any other Collective Soul album…aside from uncharacteristically unimaginative cover and heavier-than-usual reliance on sappy ballads (see “She Does” and “Hymn for My Father”) the disc is a predictably adequate listen, from the nearly-grating whistle gimmick applied to “Fuzzy” to the jarring unevenness of “Understanding” to the much more solid and sturdy “Welcome All Again” and “Dig”, it is – for better or worse – exactly what a Collective Soul album is expected to be.

Rating: 6.2 / 10

August 25, 2009
Roadrunner Records

It’s a concept so out there it has to work – Ray Davies leading the Crouch End Festival Chorus in versions of Kinks (and Davies solo) music arranged specifically for a choir, and it sounds exactly like that – a choir singing Kinks songs…but for those imagining a junior choir painfully and cluelessly hacking through “Ice Ice Baby” or a high school marching band butchering “Black Dog” beyond recognition, keep in mind that this is a choir with actual talent, and while it is inaccurate to call these “updated” versions of Kinks hits, it certainly is a fresh take on the band (and made even more of a curiosity  considering the Kinks contributions to punk and heavy metal).

Rating: 7.7 / 10

Decca Records
June 15, 2009 (UK)

Uni Classics Jazz UK
August 11, 2009 (US)