Alanis Morissette

Commencing with the sound of bongos and other world-music instrumentation, Flavors of Entanglement is clearly influenced by a much wider assortment of music than normal. After the release of her last studio album, 2004's So-Called Chaos, the Canadian singer went through a bitter break-up and had to do some serious soul-searching. She writes explicitly about coming to terms with her place in the world in "Citizen of the Planet." The song, which kicks off the disc, vacillates between quieter moments and louder ones, something Morissette has exploited ever since her 1995 hit "You Oughta Know." Here, the musicianship and production is a bit more adventurous, thanks mostly to British producer Guy Sigsworth (Björk, Imogen Heap).

Too bad so many of the lyrics, ostensibly about her recent break-up with actor Ryan Reynolds, don't match the sonic adventurousness. "Underneath" is a pretty pop ballad but ultimately bland stuff. "Tapes" has an epic feel but its mundane image ("the tapes in her head swirl around, wreaking havoc") isn't all that compelling. With its pulsating industrial noises, "Straitjacket" sounds like a mash-up of Madonna and Nine Inch Nails. The same goes for "Moratorium," the most dance-friendly tune on the album, that features an array of synthetic beats. It's catchy and quite possibly the best song on the disc. With its cooing chorus and plaintive vocals, "In Praise of the Vulnerable Man" almost sounds like an apology for "You Oughta Know." And the same goes for album-closer "Incomplete," in which Morissette asserts "one day I'll be secure." OK, if you say so. With 1995's Jagged Little Pill, Morissette made one of the most impressive debuts in recent rock history. Living up to that hasn't been easy, however, and Flavors, as much as it works on an intellectual level, just doesn't have the songwriting and lyrical depth to back up its ambitious music. — Jeff Niesel

Aimee Mann

Aimee Mann
@#%&! Smilers (Superego)

Aimee Mann has crafted a potent solo reputation over the past decade and a half with a succession of darkly sparkling albums featuring her uncanny penchant for melancholy melody and an achingly confessional lyrical style. Mann's last two albums were conceptual affairs — 2005's The Forgotten Arm was a song cycle about a dysfunctional couple's deteriorating relationship and 2006's Another Drifter in the Snow was a seasonal collection — and both reflected a shift in her songwriting perspective, inspired in large part by her work on the Magnolia soundtrack, which earned her Oscar, Grammy and Golden Globe nominations.

On @#%&! Smilers, Mann reverts to less thematic lyrical content while offering the interesting new sonic twist of replacing electric guitars with a phalanx of keyboards (pianos, Wurlitzers, analog synths, Clavinets, etc.) to accompany and often override her acoustic guitar. As a result, @#%&! Smilers may well be Mann's most fully arranged album to date, from the '70s folk/pop lilt of "Looking for Nothing" to the Cars/Fountains of Wayne synth-pop pulse of "Freeway" and the Elvis Costello-meets-Van Dyke Parks vaudeville shuffle of "Ballantines." As on past Mann albums, repeated listenings to @#%&! Smilers reveal additional highlights, as evidenced by the hushed, haunting arrangement of the Grant Lee Phillips co-penned "Little Tornado," and the balladic '80s new wave how-did-I-get-here rumination of "31 Today." Mann has once again accomplished the rare feat of reimagining her core sound in a fresh manner. — Brian Baker

Weezer

Weezer
Weezer (Geffen)

It's safe to say Weezer's third self-titled album (like the other two, it's affectionately referred to by the color of its cover) is unlike its previous two. The Blue Album (1994) introduced it to the world and remains its masterpiece. The Green Album (2001) was a straightforward return after its lengthy post-Pinkerton hiatus. The Red Album finds lead singer and main songwriter Rivers Cuomo embracing his status as frontman for an arena-rock band, which he's been doing slowly over the last few records. Opening tracks "Troublemaker" and "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn)" both seem to take the age-old rock mantra of "keep it simple, stupid" to new lows, at least in the lyrical department. You can almost guess Cuomo's every rhyme before he spits it out.

These tunes are quickly swept away by the brilliant "Pork and Beans," however, which is the type of quirky geek rock that Weezer's always done better than pretty much everyone. "Heart Songs" takes the same confessional tone as Pinkerton, but this time Cuomo's not examining his love life; he's examining the music that helped shape him. The rest of the album is a mixed bag — particularly the end, which features a trio of songs sung by the other band members. Pat Wilson and Brian Bell penned their tracks, while bassist Scott Shriner sings a Cuomo composition. They're pretty average tracks, though, which makes them seem like token gestures. — Jeremy Willets

The Wedding Present

The Wedding Present
El Ray (Manifesto)

When, in 1991, Britain's twee-pop champs the Wedding Present recorded an album with the notoriously difficult pigfuck maven Steve Albini, indie-land collectively said "huh?" But the resultant album, Seamonsters, was a career-defining high-water mark for the band, and still stands as one of its best albums. So the news that the band decided to follow its outstanding 2005 reunion record, Take Fountain, with another Albini-recorded outing, was welcome indeed. But though that sounds great on paper, it's so-so on CD.

Of course, a weak Weddoes album is still a Weddoes album, and there are great tunes here (it mostly picks up its steam toward the end). It's just that they're floating in a sea of baffling disappointments. One especially bad song even uses as its chorus the ancient Seinfeld gag "No soup for you." Perhaps "Kiss my grits, Mel" was too old a reference? Cheap catchphrase drops like that are miles beneath the talents of Wedding-Present-in-Chief Dave Gedge, rightly known as one of English rock's most brilliant poets of the lovelorn. Perhaps the quality-control lapse is due to the departure of longtime WP and Cinerama guitarist Simon Cleave, who until now had played on most of the albums Gedge made since 1995, but whatever. The point is that no matter how excited about this album any given WP fan may have been, nobody really needs it. Thanks to the advent of individual digital song purchases, I suggest that you download the five tracks between "The Trouble With Men" and "Boo Boo," and leave the full CD on the record store shelf. — Ron Kretsch

Supergrass

Supergrass
Diamond Hoo Ha (Astralwerks)

Ask your average American '90s rock fan if they remember Supergrass, and they'd probably spit out something like, "They had that song on the Clueless soundtrack." Maybe they even bought the band's debut album, I Should Coco, based on the strength of that tune. But Supergrass has been around since then, with five solid albums and a much-deserved Best Of compilation to its credit. It's mostly hung around its native Britain, playing gigs to sizeable audiences and supporting the current flavor-of-the-NME in arenas. But while those bands have tended to fizzle, Supergrass remains a constant.

It's never really broken through in the US, but someone in major-label land thankfully still feels its albums are worth releasing here. Diamond Hoo Ha is its sixth, yet another '70s-influenced album. There's fuzzy riff-based rock like the self-titled opening track, as well as balls-out stompers like "Bad Blood." Supergrass still shows glam-rock tendencies on tracks like "Rebel In You" and even ventures into Elton John territory on the piano-led romp "When I Needed You." "The Return of Inspiration" has a bit of a breezy Beach Boys feel, while "Ghost of a Friend" is the type of assured rock song that Supergrass seems to be able to pen with the greatest of ease. Yes, the calendar pages have turned since I Should Coco, but Diamond Hoo Ha is another solid entry in its discography. — JW

Gavin Rossdale

Gavin Rossdale
Wanderlust (Interscope)

It's unfortunate Gavin Rossdale, who once fronted the seminal '90s band Bush, has sunk to the status of "Gwen Stefani's husband." Rossdale showcased an inarguable songwriting talent on Bush's five albums, penning radio hit after radio hit that became true favorites of the generation that grew up listening to them. But after Bush unofficially disbanded in 2002, Rossdale became nearly obsolete, failing to revive the success of his formative band with its follow-up, the lackluster Institute, which released its only album in 2005.

Now he has gone solo, presumably in the fashion of other '90s frontmen like Smashing Pumpkin Billy Corgan (whose solo album was equally unremarkable), and it will be a miracle if any of these grunge-tinged guitar-rock songs catch on. The disc's first single, "Love Remains the Same," is flat and uninteresting, while the opener, "Can't Stop the World," is mildly engaging but forgettable. It's nice to hear Rossdale's voice wailing again, but mostly it just makes you wonder where you stashed your old Bush albums. — Emily Zemler

Walter Meego

Walter Meego
Voyager (Almost Gold Recordings)

While this decade has brought us little in the way of innovative new music genres and scenes, the past eight years have yielded some fun new spins on new wave-era pop. Walter Meego (a duo, not a person) wonderfully harkens back to Blondie's disco-bubblegum corner of new wave. Several tracks, especially the lead cut "Forever," are brilliant pop compositions that would be right at home on some late-'70s/early-'80s K-Tel compilation alongside "Call Me." There are some killer Daft Punk-y galactic booty shakers here, notably the infectious "Wanna Be a Star."

Packed with analog synthesizers, catchy sing-along hooks and danceable beats, Voyager has an exceptionally ear-friendly sound. This disc's astral-boogie, retro synth-pop simultaneously draws from the finest ingredients of Air's Moon Safari and Of Montreal's Sunlandic Twins. The cotton-candy lyrics appropriately match the music, and although Voyager has dubious nutritional value, it's a fun treat. Since the strongest songs are stacked at the beginning, if you chew the whole disc in one sitting, the bubblegum can start to lose its flavor in the second half. Fortunately, the last two cuts ("Your Love" and "In My Dreams") are both terrific slow ballad numbers that strategically close out the album. But even Voyager's weaker cuts hold up reasonably well, and the album is the right length to be sufficiently satisfying without ever getting bland enough to spit out. — Michael David Toth