Seattle-based band The Moondoggies return with one of the finest musical experiences of 2013.

While spacerock typically conjures the vast openness of interstellar space, Brooklyn’s Oceanographer nods more to the unknown territory of the deep sea.

Through the use of blips, beeps, tones and squelch, Hoofus weaves soundscapes of crashed cyberpunk epics, nightmarish video games from 15 years ago and post-krautrock electronic melodies.

Kilfoyle doesn’t so much pay tribute to the failing upper class as simply make observations, letting the listener draw his/her own conclusions.

Straight outta Beaumont, Texas, comes Purple, with a lopsided grin, brass knuckles on fists and a cool debut LP called (409).

It’s rare for a band that’s been on hiatus for over 25 years to come back and do anything worthwhile.

There is something instantly familiar and appealing about Chicago’s brightest new band, Bare Mutants, the prom band you’ve always wanted.

As such, there are six tracks, five of them shimmering, psychedelic pop that sounds like a lost time capsule from the mid to late ’60s.

Minutemen vs. Gaytheist: a contest centuries in the making!

If your world isn’t this band’s, then it can shut up for 20 minutes.

You can revel in the shimmering guitars and the wall of feedback driving such lovely tunes as “Stay With Me”, bliss out to the piano driven “You” or let your mind wander with the beautiful ambience in “Not There”.

Univox are a brilliant quartet of players who have always provided creative, complex and challenging music while never compromising the baseline of total abandon and rock and roll.

Roger Eno’s latest—and a second collaboration with the group Plumbline—is a fine (if not unsurprising) collection of ambient compositions and gentle melodies.

Four songs clock in at slightly over six minutes – you know what you’re in for.

Queens, NY’s Endangered Feces return with another furious blast of melodic hardcore that celebrates the virtues of excessive booze and poop.

Eddie Spaghetti offers up his first-ever solo album of all-original material, and though it’s a fun ride, underneath the sexy cover art, you’ll hear some of his deepest, most introspective—and best—songwriting to date.

Through death, divorce, and illness, they’ve managed to pull off something that is beautiful yet challenging. It unveils itself over time and reveals many-hued layers of complexity, yet it can also be boiled down to simple melodies.

Scout Niblett’s latest release is a journey into heartbreak, anger, jealousy, desire, and revenge—resulting in one of the darkest albums released this year.

You know that feeling when you hear a band for the first time and it’s everything you’ve been looking for without realizing it?

Like contemporaries The Will and Brainbombs, The Terrors have tapped into a unique style of horrifying rock, something that doesn’t rely on makeup or dark Ramones riffs.

Electronica composer Mark van Hoen returns with the first new Locust album in twelve years, and it continues the exotic experimentalist group’s legacy.

Nearly 30 years after its last record, new wave/new romantic pioneer Visage returns to the racks with a brand-new album.

The biggest problem with Cheap Sleaze is the unforgivably boring songs.

In revisiting the jagged guitars and measured catharses of ’90s emo-core, this Bellingham, WA foursome trades navel-gazing histrionics for freewheeling pop-punk shoutalongs.

For comprising familiar punk, indie-rock and darkwave influences, multi-generational Olympia, Washington pop-rockers’ two new Tim Green-produced EPs are surprisingly hard to pin down.

I’ll agree with the assessment of Nightingale Floors as a return to form, but not in any way that requires me to whitewash the excellence and weirdness of the band’s recent history.

The sixth studio LP from Femi Kuti, No Place For My Dream shows that not a lot has changed in the world of the most famous son of Fela Kuti – and that’s both good and bad.

Having grown up listening to Klaus Schulze as a child in my father’s apartment, it’s nice to hear my dad’s favorite electronic composer, who subsequently became one of mine, hasn’t lost his touch over his 45 year career.

In Between Tears is back, and it’s a shining gem of 70s soul.

Nothing Can Hurt Me serves as a best-of or, better yet, a great introduction for the Big Star newcomer.

What’s In Between is a smart, vibrant rock & roll record that perfect balances loose (not sloppy) performances with highly-crafted writing. .

For two guys, Noteherder & McCloud sure make one helluva racket.

The effect overall of Only Friend is a very deep aural experience, you can either intently lose yourself within it’s folds or allow it to shimmer in the background of a midnight drive or a hazily intimate evening.

No longer weary with youth, Marty Crandall and friends make a joyous rock ‘n’ roll record.

Young Seattleites Special Explosion have, since 2010, wowed locals with ahead-of-the-curve musicianship, pop hooks and presence. On its vinyl debut, the indie-rock foursome enters adulthood.

Grain is comprised of two 20+ minute tracks that ebb and flow like a Throbbing Gristle outtake.

For me, it’s not so much the message as the sound that gets me. Especially when you hit perfect summer songs like “American Lovers”.

This set, assembled for the Japanese-themed LA shop Popkiller, consists of three CDs and three cassettes, showcasing the various sounds, moods and insanities of the eccentric label, Come Records.

Impressions from inside the time cloud.

Thee mighty World War IX return with their second EP, five more songs recorded by their best lineup to date.

It’s the excitement of being in a band, loving every practice, every wrong note, every show, every argument and loving it so much you never want to do anything else.

Arrington is one of those artists (like his obvious compositional hero Captain Beefheart ) whose work must be taken in as an arc, a traveling trajectory moving through different spaces and examining the muse from myriad angles, some down and rock n roll, some more hypnagogic and trance-worthy.

Once again, Athens, GA’s HHBTM hits a home run, this time with an English band sure to be dominating the Indie charts in months to come.

With the Church on hiatus (maybe), Steve Kilbey‘s ongoing work with All India Radio composer/ leader Martin Kennedy has become his most high profile artistic endeavor.

Texas-based sibling band Eisley return with their fourth album, one that shows a band that has matured greatly since their stunning third album, The Valley.

JC Brooks & The Uptown Sound’s third album finds them eschewing most of the 60s-inspired retro soul of their previous album, in favor of a contemporary style that is much sexier and romantic. This is a very good thing.

With their debut LP, the trio delivers a definitive statement of disenchantment that adds to the annals of great bands from Athens, GA.