Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Fever to Tell

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs' music explodes in a sea of overt sexuality and frenzied emotion, hinting at hooks and sometimes even getting totally enveloped in them, as on the disarmingly charming "Maps." On the other end of the spectrum lies the raw MC 5 full-on punk-blues of tracks such as "Man" and "Tick." On FEVER TO TELL, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs prove their ability to stand out in a crowd, offering perhaps the most original recording to be hailed in the '00s garage-rock revival.

The Chemical Brothers - Exit Planet Dust

Exit Planet Dust is a record concerned more with the urban jungle than space-time continuums, although there's no shortage of tripped-out effects, stereo panning, reverb, and a healthy amount of studio gimcrackery. Mobile fidelity is the nucleus here, so anyone expecting ambience need look elsewhere. With this record, one of the first to break so-called "electronica" mainstream and on Main Street, USA, The Brothers have assimilated so many dancefloor ideologies that their stance within the "big beat" genre should ultimately get them through the next musical revolution--and beyond. To many, this is the possible future of pop: Spock & roll, anyone?

Beirut - Flying Club Cup

Joni Mitchell - Wild Things Run Fast

Britney Spears - Oops I Did It Again

Given the phenomenal success of Britney Spears' debut, ...Baby One More Time, it should come as no surprise that its sequel offers more of the same. After all, she gives away the plot with the ingenious title of her second album, Oops!...I Did It Again, essentially admitting that the record is more of the same. It has the same combination of sweetly sentimental ballads and endearingly gaudy dance-pop that made One More Time. Fortunately, she and her production team not only have a stronger overall set of songs this time, but they also occasionally get carried away with the same bewildering magpie aesthetic that made the first album's "Sodapop" -- a combination of bubblegum, urban soul, and raga -- a gonzo teen pop classic. It doesn't happen all that often -- the clenched-funk revision of the Stones' deathless "Satisfaction" is the most obvious example -- but it helps give the album character apart from the well-crafted dance-pop and ballads that serve as its heart. In the end, it's what makes this an entertaining, satisfying listen.

The Cardigans - My Favourite

The Smiths - The Queen is Dead

Audio CD (October 25, 1990)
Original Release Date: June 1986
Number of Discs: 1
Label: Warner Bros / Wea

1. The Queen Is Dead/Take Me Back To Dear Old Blighty (Medly)
2. Frankly, Mr. Shankly
3. I Know It's Over
4. Never Had No One Ever
5. Cemetry Gates
6. Bigmouth Strikes Again
7. The Boy With The Thorn In His Side
8. Vicar In A Tutu
9. There Is A Light That Never Goes Out
10. Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others