Death Cab for Cutie - Narrow Stairs
Mixing pop melodies with dark themes, crunchy production, and 5-minute instrumental intros, Death Cab for Cutie presents a mature follow-up to 2005’s Plans. Those looking for the next “I Will Follow You Into the Dark” may be disapointed, but Narrow Stairs offers its own share of potential singles, from the ironically bright “No Sunshine” to the speedy “Long Division.”

Duffy - Rockferry
Those tempted to dismiss Duffy as only the latest pair of false eyelashes to straggle through the British neo-soul parade owe it to themselves to listen to Rockferry, a more authentic record than the debuts from Joss Stone or Amy Winehouse.
 
 
 
Jason Mraz - We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things
On We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things, Jason Mraz makes a smooth transition to blue-eyed soul crooner. He hasn’t abandoned his fratty folk — there’s a long duet with James Morrison — but most of this record rides sleek grooves that are almost seductive enough to camouflage his scatting and occasional smutty joke.

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Elvis Costello & the Imposters - Momofuku
Originally planned as just a vinyl record and digital download but now seeing release as a CD, Momofuku stands apart from all recent Elvis Costello by not being a conceptual project but rather a collection of songs. Written and recorded quickly at the start of the year, the album benefits from its speedy conception as it has energy and its songs aren’t fussy, two things that help make this one of Costello’s stronger latter-day records.

Gavin DeGraw - Gavin DeGraw
This week, Gavin DeGraw delivers his second album. It’s been a long five years between Chariot and Gavin DeGraw but the singer/songwriter hasn’t changed much, if at all, during that half decade as the only clear difference between the two albums is that this is bigger and slicker than the debut.
 
 
 
Neil Diamond - Home Before Dark
Home Before Dark is Diamond’s second collaboration with producer Rick Rubin. He is accompanied by Benmont Tench and Mike Campbell from the Heartbreakers, and session aces Smokey Hormel, and Matt Sweeney. There are no drums, just Diamond’s old-school, percussive acoustic guitar banging. Lyrically, Diamond offers direct, searing honesty combined with hook-drenched tunes. It’s a lean, hungry and wildly inspired album.

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Robert Forster - The Evangelist
Robert Forster’s first solo offering in over a decade, The Evangelist, is also his first record since the death of his partner in the Go-Betweens, Grant McLennan, and it features the last three songs that Forster and McLennan worked on together. It also features backing from fellow Go-Betweens bassist Adele Pickvance and drummer Glenn Thompson with production by long-time cohort Mark Wallis. Throughout The Evangelist, Forster’s writing is very different from his previous solo offerings; it’s elegant, but less concerned with literary allusion, metaphor and third person narrative. Instead, it’s nakedly honest and vulnerable, while giving up none of the elegant craft of his finest work.

Madonna - Hard Candy
On Hard Candy, her final album for Warner, Madonna has enlisted the Neptunes, Timbaland and Justin Timberlake as producers to help her make a cold, hard dance record. Hard Candy certainly sounds like recent productions by these two teams but instead of sounding ahead of the curve, Madonna sounds like she’s dressed in Nelly Furtado’s hand-me-downs — and she also doesn’t sound all that into her makeover, either.

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Billy Bragg - Mr. Love & Justice
Billy Bragg sounded confident and all but unbeatable on his first few albums in the ’80s, but political and creative uncertainty has dominated much of his work since then. Thankfully, 2008’s Mr. Love & Justice, the Brit singer-songwriter’s first full-length studio effort since his disappointing 2002 effort England, Half English is a return to form. The scope of the album is often modest, but it speaks with grace, wisdom, and heart, and finds Bragg a bit older, a bit wiser, and still committed to fighting the good fight.

Flight of the Conchords - Flight of the Conchords
Stars of the HBO series Flight of the Conchords, Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement unleash the songs from season one on their new full length produced by Mickey Petralia (Beck’s Midnight Vultures, Ladytron’s Light & Magic.) A parody of everyone from Shabba Ranks to Hall and Oates, most of the best cuts are here, and the music is funny and diverse enough to keep even the biggest haters of New Zealand digi-acoustic funk folk thoroughly entertained.

The Replacements - Let It Be (Deluxe Edition)
At long last, the Replacements’ catalog is getting the deluxe reissue treatment, beginning this week with their Twin/Tone catalog: their debut Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash, the mini-LP Stink, their messy breakthrough Hootenanny and the undisputed classic Let It Be. All the CDs are remastered, contain excellent bonus tracks (such as Sorry Ma getting Paul Westerberg’s early acoustic gem, “If Only You Were Lonely”) and have great liner notes.

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Air - Moon Safari (10th Anniversary Deluxe Edition)
The 10th anniversary of Air’s full-length debut Moon Safari is as good a time as any to reappraise the electronica classic and, refreshingly, find that time has not dulled the sharp edge of one of the best albums of the ’90s.
 
 
 
Frank Black - SVN FNGRS
Frank Black’s mini-album SVN FNGRS is just as conceptual as last year’s Black Francis album Bluefinger was, drawing inspiration from Irish mythology instead of the life and death of Dutch painter/punk Herman Brood. Musically speaking, SVN FNGRS is even better than Bluefinger, delivering Black’s cranky weirdness, poetic ballads and storytelling in a highly concentrated dose.

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The Breeders - Mountain Battles
Mountain Battles is the Breeders’ first album in six years, but the band haven’t lost any of their creativity or unpredictability. Kim Deal and company offer up a few instantly catchy songs that could have appeared on Last Splash, but they spend most of Mountain Battles exploring the moody vignettes and experimental tangents that have always lurked around the edges of Breeders albums. Despite, or perhaps because of, its lack of standout singles, Mountain Battles is a remarkably satisfying album.

The Duke Spirit - Neptune
On Cuts Across the Land, the Duke Spirit seemed to be yet another bluesy British garage rock revival band — albeit one with a more captivating frontwoman than most in singer Liela Moss. Their second album Neptune, however, shows just how much wider and deeper the Duke Spirit’s sound goes. The band opts for a more polished sound and embraces everything from Motown to sea shanties, but make it all sound completely natural and captivating.

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