I confess, I find Ms. Marling’s prodigious, precocious talent and her back-story more consuming than her actual albums.

Most double LPs are “sprawling,” but this isn’t; it’s focused on tough, catchy, old fashioned roots-rock, with southern blues and R&B flavors.

But how pleasantly big a surprise to find that they’ve kept their challenging, moody guitar rock base, yet totally overhauled the formula, pumping up the volume into a five times heavier, louder, denser, more pulsating framework!

Hopes and expectations don’t always pan out.

You wonder who at the label had the temerity to sign and promote German composer Volker Bertelmann , a pianist by trade whose classical chamber music bears no hint of rock whatsoever, as if it had never been invented.

Berkeley CA’s John Ringhofer must have ADD. His fifth LP for Asthmatic Kitty is a study in “get in, get out, do your business… and run away before anyone gets a clue of what you’re up to!”

This Barcelona band’s fourth LP still sounds a lot more like they’re an American band out of Los Angeles clubs than anything that might bear their true Castilian markings.

Singer/songwriter Gouette is a staple of the busy New London, CT scene and its documenting Cosmo label, appearing on its various scene compilations, and issuing three singles and now two LPs for the imprint.

While one would want to avoid an electric jellyfish while swimming, not so the band of that name.

The seventh installment of Dondero’s solo career finds the old hand Austin, TX folkie as ever mining that bittersweet intersection—can we call it the crossroads?—where ancient Dixie folk, blues, and country pop meet and have a shot of White Lightning at the local saloon.

Having just reviewed this reformed band’s new EP, here’s the other one also released this year—although in this case, the recordings date from the late ‘70s Manchester band’s first revival, back in 1995, but they were unissued until now.

The trend of bands from the late ‘70s/’80s reforming and doing work that doesn’t embarrass their halcyon days continues!

Although this is the debut LP (following some 2009 EPs) by an L.A. street punk band, they sure want to be an early ‘80s English Oi! Band.

If you’re throwing a shindig any time soon, this pioneering 26-year New Orleans country-punk trio led by Bill Davis (the sole original member) wants to be invited.

Fifty-five years is a hell of a long career (albeit with several long breaks for serious illness and injury), but few have earned it more richly than Dale.

The hardest trick for a roots-rock/pop, americana, or alt.country band is to take something that’s that traditional—what’s a hundred years?—and try to make it sound contemporary instead of boringly old-timey, like a singing group playing on Disney’s fake-as-folksy Main Street.

Though the excuse for this release is the 80th anniversary of Charles birth, none is needed for an artist of whom the tag “genius” really wasn’t and still isn’t a stretch.

I lavished deserved praise on this Beverly, MA (greater Boston) instrumental group’s The Four Trees double album debut three years ago, this CD reissue of the group’s 2005 debut EP is more of the same only even more commanding!

When last we heard from this Aussie folkpop singer three years ago on When I Cross the River , our own Mark Suppanz was comparing his delicate grace and involved guitar playing to Tim Buckley and Nick Drake.

I remember seeing the stunning 1971 documentary Blue Water White Death sometime in the ‘80s, both fascinated and for many weeks haunted by incredible underwater photographer Peter Gimbel ’s death-defying images of the monster Great White Sharks off of Australia’s barrier reefs.

This debut LP chronicles the two-year gestation of Viva Voce ’s two songwriter/musicians, Kevin Robinson and Anita Robinson ’s attempt to form a side-band country-rock supergroup.

The well-meaning gent that suggested I try this band called them “prog-psych,” which, to these ears promised a paring of “Pictures of Matchstick Men” Status Quo with Genesis’s The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway . I.e., 1968 meets 1974.

Anderson is one of the two younger guitarists/backing singers that have kicked Paul McCartney in the ass since they joined his touring band in 2001 (the other being Brian Ray ).

With an album title (and title track) like this, and other tunes such as “Superman Can’t Move His Legs,” “Jesus Doesn’t Love Me,” and “Dead as Disco,” you might expect Where to be a funny album.

Go-Go Boots has been described by Drive-By Truckers leader Patterson Hood as the band’s “country/soul/murder ballad” record.

Thus will one of indie rock’s pioneering talents be introduced (hopefully) to a new generation.

Whether you want to recapture the days of Echo & The Bunnymen or looking to get lost in a daydream, let By The Hedge be the soundtrack. There’s much to enjoy.

Ness is zooming down a well-traveled road, but he’s doing it full throttle, and his band is right there with him.

Dye It Blonde is wistful, fun, and a great album that sounds perfectly at home on my turntable.

Like an unholy cross between the Pogues at their most shambolic and the Dogs D’amour at their most out of control, the Medicine Bow kicks out the crusty cowpunk jams.

For cosmic reasons unknown, there’s been resurgence in Satanic-themed hard rock bands, especially with Scandinavian origin.

With a sound driven by various mandolins and bouzoukis and a small posse of lead singers on hand, Patterson eschews pretty much everything from his past to delve into string-based world music, particularly the Celtic/Middle Eastern fusion pioneered by obvious inspiration Dead Can Dance.

The Best of Kimberley Rew collects 14 cuts from those LPs, covering a nearly 30-year time span, and makes a strong case for Rew’s strengths as a power pop auteur.

Action 45’s “Bastards Of America” combines old skool punk intensity with new school chops.

The breadth of that career is the subject of I’ll Tell You What I Saw, a compilation of Gunn’s work over the past couple of decades that showcases not only his acclaimed solo material, but also his work with musicians from Russia, Finland, Italy and Mexico.

Labirinto weaves a tapestry of strings, clean and distorted guitars, a few drums, and an occasional banjo. Band leader and songwriter Erick Cruxen blends the most pure musical parts of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, the plotting picking of Explosions In The Sky, and a few assaulting moments worthy of Russian Circles. This being their first full-length release also leads one to believe that the band has the potential to rank among these highly regarded groups.

American Hardcore- A Tribal History is the definitive book on Hardcore Punk Rock

Some tunes work better than others, naturally, but regardless of quality the cuts sound like they were recorded by a dozen different bands, instead of one band with diverse interests.

The TL3 channels its breadth of talent into 21 tracks of warm, melodic and vibrant rock & roll.

Nicholas Chapel, the songwriter/multi-instrumentalist who trades under the name Demians, need never seek therapy, if his band’s second album Mute is any indication.

Tangents unleash one of the better post- Radiohead rock albums in recent memory with its debut One Little Light Year.

This isn’t a dance or ambient album – the electronica forms more of a pulse behind the otherwise rocking music, giving the songs a driving groove.

The self-titled debut overfloweth with mountain-scaled melodies, pealing guitars, lung-filled vocals and song titles like “Forgiveness” and “Atone.”

Frank Turner releases the best album of 2010 with “Rock & Roll”

Legacy’s two-disc set spotlights two sides of Carole King’s career: solo artist and songwriter.

With the profile of Antibalas higher than ever thanks to the band providing the score for the award-winning musical Fela!, its former label takes the opportunity to reissue one of its seminal works.

Half of Forgive Yr. Blood could very easily fit on a soundtrack to a modern western, while other songs come across as soulful deconstructions of tunes from John Hughes teen flicks. There’s some folk, some indie pop, and what could have been a backing track from the Beastie Boys‘ Check Your Head. Even with all of these flavors, there is no hint of pretentiousness.

With an intimate approach featuring little more than his guitar and voice, Toth boils down decades of folk, country and blues stylings into his own personal artistry, comfortable with tradition but not constrained by it.

This Rare and Unseen entry on David Bowie isn’t essential, but Bowie die-hards will enjoy newly-surfaced interview clips featuring their hero.

Duveen’s versatile vocals slot right in like the musical settings were custom made.