Ken Tucker

The achievement of Supernova is that, five albums in, LaMontagne hasn't settled into a formula or a fall-back recurring mood. Here, the singer-songwriter explores a sunny, psychedelic side.

On Nikki Nack, Merrill Garbus worries over the notion that she's just an accumulation of her influences, and she fights back wonderfully.

Largely ignored today, the rough-and-tumble quintet from Newcastle-Upon-Tyne gets reassessed in a new box set, titled The Mickie Most Years & More.

Make My Head Sing... is an album of contradictions. It's full of unreliable narrators who sometimes revel in jealousy, willful insanity and drugs, even as her voice and the music suggest otherwise.

Aimee Mann and Ted Leo began performing together in 2012, when Leo was Mann's opening act. Mann began joining Leo onstage during his set. Their debut album is "The Both."

The country singer treats the classic songs on her new album like living, vital pieces of art that can withstand being taken apart, thought about and re-imagined.

The Mekons and Waco Brothers veteran often places his left-wing politics front and center in his music and art. Here Be Monsters has a way of mixing pretty melodies with harsh criticisms.

Surrounded on the charts by younger men and their big hits about drinking and partying, Sara Evans' hit-single success of Slow Me Down's title song all the more heartening.

Olsen has often been called a folk singer, but Ken Tucker says her new album — her first with a backing band — takes her music into an unclassifiable realm.

To hear G I R L, you'd think Pharrell's world consisted of grooving on catchy beats and flirting with women. It's a lightweight image that draws gravitas from his prolific work ethic.