The following have appeared in publications both online and off.

Patti Smith: Trampin' It seems that if you hang in there long enough without going off the rails or ODing or expiring on the crapper you get to become an elder statesperson of sorts. Is it out of respect or faulty memory that people tend to ignore the fact that by a certain age your best stuff is long behind you? I mean, by the end his lengthy life, Bob Hope was so damned loved - but for what? Hosting a golf tournament? He hadn't made an even remotely funny movie since the 1940s. Not that Patti Smith - who has been embraced by today's kids as the Godmother of Punk - hasn't put out a notable album since her 1996 return, "Gone Again." And not that she's ready to stage the Patti Smith Invitational. But the quality and power of her work in the last decade has been, sad to say, nowhere in the same league as her first four records from the '70s: "Horses," "Radio Ethiopia," "Easter" and my personal favorite, "Wave." That is, until now. It's hard to know what we'll think of it in 10 years time, but "Trampin'" sounds like it will be vividly remembered as one of Smith's finest, a culmination of the things she has labored for and leaned toward. It's all here: the poetess, the firebrand, the anarchist, the kick-your-muthafuckin'-ass rocker. And let's not forget singer, because "Trampin'" features perhaps Smith's best vocals ever. What were once the ragged pipes of an enthusiastic amateur (who can ever forget Gilda Radner's spastic parody on "SNL"?) have transformed with age into an affectless, pliable and smoky voice that has genuine depth and soul. Just listen to how she snakes herself around the liquid melodies of "Mother Rose" and "Cartwheels" or the manner in which she mewls her way through the Stonesy "Stride of the Mind" or the way she spits out "shock and awe!" on "Radio Baghdad." It helps that behind the singer is one of the crack rough and raw bands around. Guitarist Lenny Kaye and drummer Jay Dee Daugherty (who've been with Patti since "Horses"), kick out the jams, marching along with authority and verve from the opening call to arms "Jubilee" to the apocalyptic "Radio Baghdad," which beseeches us to "Suffer not / The paralysis of your neighbor / Suffer not / But extend your hand." The song clocks in at a staggering 12 minutes, but never once does Patti's rap come over as indulgent, pedantic or polemical; more, you sympathize with her fear and outrage at an administration that starts a war and that behaves with "no chivalry involved." Through the travails of a terrorized world and an indifferent God, Smith, as she always has, cleaves to art as well as to artists for her salvation. And it's not just a matter of dropping names, as many pretenders do, but of understanding what they were after and incorporating those sensibilities into the work. Of the song "My Blakean Year," she remarks that the visionary and heretical poet "has served as a good example in facing my own difficulties and feeling a certain satisfaction in doing so." You could say that Smith has served the same purpose for her legion of followers. She has lived an impossibly complex and difficult yet fascinating life, and, at 57, she retains an edge and the presence of mind to document her experiences for all who would care to hear. And with "Trampin'," she's finding again the means to say it. Call it her weapon of mass construction.

Gomez: Split the Difference I'm not certain why Gomez conjure calumny in their native U.K., where they are often dismissed as second-division dad rockers. Yes, these five scousers - Ian Ball (vocals, guitar, harmonica), Tom Gray (vocals, guitar, keyboards), Ben Ottewell (vocals, guitar), Paul Blackburn (bass, guitar) and Olly Peacock (drums) - freely pillage their fathers' record collections for whatever turns them on, but like Beck, they take it all in and turn out something else - something that kicks with tension and fury. Whereas their last album, 2002's "In Our Gun," was willfully experimental and cockeyed, their latest, "Split the Difference," is decidedly more straightforward. "This time we were interested in coming up with something more visceral," says Gray, and he's spot on. Holing themselves up in a remote locale on the Sussex coast, the band had nothing else to do but focus on forging clattering rock noise irradiated with West Coast sunshine. With their thrashy guitars and gallumphing drums, songs like "Do One," "These 3 Sins," and "Silence" - the hot-rocking trilogy that begins the album, show a band brimming with bile and channeling it into spit-tunes that don't forego melody. Most of the rest of the record is brutally crunchy but also honeyed, like an overstuffed mouthful of trail mix. Even the burnished country waltz of "Sweet Virginia" is not without splinters. Spotlighting Ottewell's affecting burr of a voice, closer "There It Was" breaks down the blitzkrieg, sending "Split the Difference" off into a haunting mist. This is a starkers and often quite brilliant record.

David Byrne: Grown Backwards For David Byrne, there is no looking back - at least at his work with Talking Heads. And although that may vex the fogies who are still clutching their worn copies of "Remain in Light" (and are likely rejoicing over the Pixies' reunion), Byrne appears to have hung up his big suit for good. Indeed, the album's title is not meant to signal a retreat; rather, a new writing process, where everyone's favorite polymath worked, as he says, from the "top down," singing bits of tunes that popped into his head into a small tape recorder and later sorting out lyrics and chord structure. Having moved on from his world beat and tropicalismo phases, he now is enamored with forms like tango and opera, and "Grown Backwards" finds Byrne "covering" "Un di Felice" from Verdi's "La Traviata" and "Au Fond du Temple Saint" from Bizet's "The Pearl Fisher." Purists may scoff, but it's a bold move and, surprisingly, his idiosyncratic voice works effectively - and these pieces fit right in with his own limpid melodies, which have a genteel flow unusual for Byrne. Beginning with the sparely orchestrated "Glass, Concrete and Stone," David declares he's "Lookin' at happiness / keepin' my flavor fresh," and the bright marimba underscores a sense of rejuvenation. Strings spill over into Byrne's spin on Lambchop's "The Man Who Loved Beer" with deliciously lugubrious results. "Tiny Apocalypse" smiles as it sambas off to oblivion and "Dialog Box" trips along on a dusty groove and actually employs electric guitar. Don't know where "Grown Backwards" fits in the scheme of things, and Bryne himself, like most middle-aged folks, seems equally perplexed - but also undaunted. On "Why," he sings: "I don't have any philosophy / Why do I know what I know? / I see the world in a coffee cup / And when I drink it down there I go."

Jim White: Drill a Hole in That Substrate and Tell Me What You See Joe Henry knows a thing or three about shaping atmosphere and mood on his own discs, and his late-night approach, which recalls Daniel Lanois' gauzy yet ornate productions, creates just the right setting for Jim White's third album. White's always been a tough nut to crack - not a bad thing - and what would you expect from a Pentacostalist turned surfer turned fashion model turned Southern Gothic singer/songwriter? Not that "Drill a Hole" is a difficult listen - in fact it's frequently warm and tuneful even when it's a bit heebie-jeebie inducing. Aimee Mann backs him on opener "Static on the Radio," a tune that would be a hit on some alt-universe playlist. Admittedly, there's some peculiar stuff going on here - "Combing's" mutant funk, "Brownsville's" wistful waltz, "Jesus Drove a Motorhome's" wonked-out jazzedelia - but it all goes down as smooth as a whiskey neat. With his whispery voice miked so close that it sounds as though he's nestled against your eardrum, White relates tales of salvation and sin dipped in Faulkner's swampy mire. And like primordial ooze, his songs suck you in. Fall asleep to it and "Drill a Hole" may swallow you whole.

Stereolab: Margerine Eclipse It's impossible to listen to this album and not think about Mary Hansen, a long-time member of Stereolab who died in a 2002 cycling accident. But anyone expecting "Margerine Eclipse" to be a downer, or a radical departure, will be pleased that this finds Stereolab percolating along much in the way it always has, if not possibly even more refined and effervescent. Laetitia Sadier's singsong vocals may not be demonstrative (to say the least) but they are always affecting, blending seamlessly cheery rhythms that gyrate gracefully like a plate spinner. From the first track, "Vonal Declosion," which flits about in a delicate hummingbird frenzy, the album seemingly runs with no off switch, casting one spark and then another. Not that the members of Stereolab are in denial. "Memory of a friend, memory I need to embrace," Sadier warbles on "Feel and Triple," a tune that starts with a downbeat sentiment but ultimately picks up in terms of pace and outlook. In their own exquisitely minimalist fashion, Stereolab have again produced an album that's both hypnotic and tender. But also uplifting. Which is a commendable thing, considering the umbrella of sadness under which it came to life. Music to boost the spirit.

Dumptruck: D Is for Dumptruck; Positively Dumptruck; For the Country Dumptruck appeared in the early '80s right as the Southern alternative scene - which included such bands of note as Let's Active, the dB's and, of course, R.E.M. - was infiltrating college radio. Although they were from Massachusetts, Dumptruck - whose mainstays were essentially singers and guitarists Kirk Swan and Seth Tiven - made music that was not unlike what could be heard in Athens: angular, jangly, intelligent, relentlessly hooky but never too sweet. These three records, which have long been unavailable in any format, show plainly just how inventive and tuneful this little-known band was, and how much of a shame it is that they've never gotten their due. "D Is for Dumptruck" is the most raw and rocking, at times sounding like a less-brittle Television; "Positively Dumptruck," produced by Don Dixon, shaves off the rough edges but none of the band's feral intensity; and the Swan-less "For the Country" sees Tiven taking the group - which, at this point, contained guitarist Kevin Salem - into a twangy territory now occupied by the likes of the Jayhawks. All of these albums are remastered, all have dregs-free bonus tracks that feature some crazy-ass live cuts and all are just waiting for you to rediscover them.

Jeff Kelly: For the Swan in the Hallway Green Pajaman Jeff Kelly says that "For the Swan in the Hallway" is, unlike 2001's Catholic-guilt-wracked "Indiscretion," about desire, and indeed from his yearning vocals to the loping rhythms that tug at you like a child's needy hand, this album is infused with longing - the kind inspired by a trip abroad. Which is what Kelly did recently, and in the doing, the songs came to him. Ditching his day job's penchant for neo-psychedelia, "For the Swan in the Hallway" is a mostly strum, mostly plaintive and reflective record that, like, say Westminster Abbey, has regal edifices covered over with the bluish dust of age. Kelly's way of singing is not about bowling you over; rather, in a self-effacing fashion, nudging you, which makes it all the more charming and enchanting. He puts it to especially good use on the ballad "The Depth of My Desire," which he likely knows he could never explain well enough in two minutes and 30 seconds, but somehow nearly does. Says Kelly, "Tetleys, cigarettes and extremely stimulating conversation in a dark 300-year-old pub" informs "The Swan on the Hill," and a thing of grace it is - along with a bit of menace, which swans can be. "Oxford Street" recalls a sunny spring day, one, alas, that's not without dread: "The afternoon is brilliant blue / filled with a vibration / still I feel a cold anonymous sensation," Kelly drawls out wistfully. These are ruminations of an outsider looking in. The best place for any artist to reside.

Underworld: 1992-2002 Once at the leading edge of the electronica movement, Underworld now sound a bit quaint, especially because, like, say, the Chemical Brothers or the Orb, their bag of sampled and computer-driven rhythm effects have a fairly quick sell-by date. That's not to diminish the overall work of Underworld mainstays Rick Smith and Karl Hyde, who, with tracks such as "Born Slippy" and "Dark & Long," definitely put the acid in acid house. "1992-2002" is about as good an overview of Underworld as one could want; it's packed with hypnotic, monochromatic stompers like "Rez" and "Cowgirl" and pulsing mood pieces such as "Pearl" and "Eight Ball" that will fill you with ecstasy whether you are on drugs or not. But for those desiring something more forward looking, check out what Four Tet, Minotaur Shock and Mice Parade are up to these days.

Joe Strummer & the Mescaleros: Streetcore In the last year or so we've lost some of our most beloved artists, some of whom (George Harrison, Warren Zevon, Johnny Cash) managed to produce one last album to say their final piece. Although he didn't know it at the time, Joe Strummer was also working on what would become his last musical testament. And even though it's not hard to get a bit sentimental listening to "Streetcore," it's certainly not an album by someone who was backpedaling or had lost his way. If anything, Strummer had demonstrated on 1999's "Rock, Art and the X-Ray Style" and 2001's "Global a Go-Go" that he'd finally regained the fire that seemed to have been extinguished when the Clash finally crashed. It's a terrible shame that Strummer is no longer with us, because he obviously had lots more to say and, from listening to "Streetcore," lots of energy to say it with. Opener "Coma Girl" rips along like classic Clash, with Strummer spitting out the lyrics as only he can in a voice that resonates with humor and humanity. Every song on this album is a treasure, from the reggae-fied "Get Down Moses" to the elegiac folk of "Long Shadow" to the roaring "All in a Day" to the brave reading of Bob Marley's "Redemption Song." So, this is all there is and all there ever will be. Glad I lived in the time of Joe Strummer. Never to be forgotten.

The Strokes: Room on Fire It's nearly impossible to get past all the BS that has surrounded this little band since it became a sensation even before the release of its debut "Is This It" back around the turn of the century. Not only has the hype been ludicrously annoying and over the top for such a young act, but also there has been all the copyists and wannabes we've had to endure - the endless succession of "the" bands. It's enough to turn you off pop music in general and the Strokes in particular. Until, of course, you just play their damn albums. And then you remember that this is some pretty cool shit. "Room on Fire" makes no great strides forward from its predecessor. No, it merely delivers the goods: 33 efficient minutes of crackin' rock 'n' roll that's high in energy and passion and thankfully devoid of even a whiff of pretense. Each tune percolates with intensity and abandon. Then there's "Under Control," the album's obvious watershed track, which, in its modest way, is brimming with the sort of yearning that brings to mind a "Moonlight Mile" or a "Maggie Mae." Throughout, the production is dead on: tinny guitars, tinny drums and, best of all, Julian Casablancas' tinny drawl. "Room on Fire" smokes.

Belle and Sebastian: Dear Catastrophe Waitress For their sixth album, the shaggy Scottish collective brings aboard producer Trevor Horn, who lights up "Dear Catastrophe Waitress" with bells and whistles - literally. The production may be tight and detailed, but the band still manages to remain warm and fuzzy, sounding at times like a cross between the Cowsills and "Village Green"-era Kinks ("Phenomenal Cat" wouldn't be out of place here). It doesn't get breezier than on "Step Into My Office, Baby," "If She Wants Me," "Roy Walker" and "Piazza, New York Catcher," all of which have Stuart Murdoch trilling like Nick Drake on helium. As before, beneath the wit and whimsy lurks something sinister. But why focus on the dark when there's so much light? A real charmer, this.

Ashley Park: The Secretariat Motor Hotel A concept album of sorts, "The Secretariat Motor Hotel" tells the multifarious tales of life at a fictional roadside inn. Singer and songwriter Terry Miles employs just the right dry and dusty notes to frame his vignettes, which, he says, are "a tapestry of lonely city life and longing for the country." With a down-home production (most of the material was recorded in Terry's basement on a laptop) and affecting touches - a shimmering pedal steel here and a simmering organ there - this album oozes melancholy. We come to empathize with such down and outers as Father Hill, Mad Cameron Howard and Rocco the Policeman (and his dog) just like Dylan engaged us with Hattie Carroll, Hollis Brown and John Wesley Harding. Tying it all together is Miles and girlfriend Kelly Haigh's harmonizing - he sounds as comfortable with her as Gram did with Emmylou. Listen to "The Secretariat Motor Hotel" and feel high and lonesome.

April March: Triggers It's early evening and I'm sitting at a table at Le Deux Magots, sipping absinthe, smoking Gitanes and discussing "Being and Nothingness" with Simone de Beauvoir when Serge Gainsbourg comes bustling up Saint Germain Boulevard with a CD in his hand. "Monsieur," he bellows in his whiskey-soaked croak, "have you heard 'Triggers,' the latest from Mademoiselle April March?" "No, I have not," I respond. "Oh, monsieur, she's ... she's fantastique!" Serge goes on, "better than Bardot or Birkin, better even than France Gall!" We slap the disc in a boom box, hit play and suddenly I find myself transported into a conga line along with, well, let's see, there's Charles Trenet, Edith Piaf, Beatrice Dalle ... and over there is Andre Gide, Marcel Duchamp, Michel Polnareff and even cranky ol' Albert Camus, who can be heard grumbling, "Je ne pige rien a ca." The entire sweaty throng is intoxicated by April's ethereal singing, slammin' dance beats and je ne sais quoi. Giddy madness.

South: With the Tides For those who find Radiohead's last few albums too challenging, South could be what you are looking for. Their second album, "With the Tides," swirls around in the blue depths of melody as if it has "The Bends." Unlike their debut, 2001's "From Here On In," which reflected the eletronica sensibilities of its producer, Mo' Wax chief James Lavelle, "With the Tides" is a bit more rock oriented, thanks to Dave Eringa, who was behind the board with the Manic Street Preachers, Ash and Idlewild. Jaime McDonald has a achingly gorgeous voice, and he puts it to effective use on "Motiveless Crime," a tune whipped into a storm by whacking drums, burning bass and surging strings. "Colours in Waves" uses many of the same elements, but has a fury all its own. "Loosen Your Hold" incorporates harpsichord, banjo and baroque touches, the gentle "Nine Lives" is colored with harp and cello, "Mend These Trends" trips along on a spacey groove and "Silver Sun" sounds as remote as a lost planet. No bold new ground broken here, then, just a satisfying collection of songs.

Them: Now and Them When Van Morrison abandoned Ireland's Them in the mid-'60s following the success of "Gloria" and "Here Comes the Night," the group split into two factions, with half forming the Belfast Gypsies under the auspices of Kim Fowley while the other half kept the original name and picked up singer Kenny McDowell. For most Americans this information may only serve you in a game of Musical Trivial Pursuit, but if you're a fan of West Coast pop pysch you'll find "Now and Them" pretty cool. Recorded in LA by garage rock producer Ray Ruff, the album may not have Morrison's distinctive R&B vocals or songwriting talents, but it does brim with plenty of energy and raw playing. Mostly, it's covers, like John Mayall's "I'm Your Witch Doctor," Timi Yuro's "What's the Matter Baby" and Goffin/King's "I Happen to Love You," all of which had been done already and, especially on "Nobody Loves You When You're Down and Out," done much better. But the group does a bit of exploring on its own with the jazzy "Truth Machine" and the nine-minute raga workout "Square Room," which shows an experimental bent. None of this would be taken much further (only one more album followed before Them's guys called it a day), but "Now and Them" is still a nifty disc, one to file alongside your Electric Prunes and Chocolate Watchband albums.

Guided by Voices: Earthquake Glue Twenty years on and Guided by Voices show no signs of slowing - this, their bee-thousandth album, rocks like an earthquake and sticks like glue. Although they are known primarily for bruising guitars, dangerous riffs and raucous drums, Robert Pollard and friends also have a fragile side, and that's here too on songs like the wonky "My Son, My Secretary and My Country," the wibbly "Beat Your Wings" and the weirdly Wyatt-ish "A Trophy Mule in Particular." The rest is an uplifting (and crisply produced) bash fest, far more focused than last year's all-over-the-map "Universal Truths and Cycles." Pollard is not only a musician but a rambunctious music fan, and perhaps that's the reason behind his prodigious output - he just can't contain his passion for everything that enters his orbit, so it simply must come out in song. That also explains the unabashed joy one gets from listening to tunes like "Secret Star," "Of Mites and Men" and "Useless Inventions," all of which thrash about with tension and release that never lets go. He just so digs what he's doing, and you do, too. Another year, another great GBV record. Ho-hum.

Mogwai: Happy Songs for Happy People Their fourth proper album continues to see this Glaswegian quartet kick up the brackish discord found on 2001's "Rock Action," although "Happy Songs for Happy People" is a tad subtler. That doesn't mean this is an easy-listening experience. Songs like "Hunted by a Freak," "Killing All the Flies" and "Boring Machines Disturb Sleep" blaze out of the speakers in thickets of noise. With its turgid, whip-crack rhythm, "Moses? I Amn't" has the solemn air of a harrowing religious hymn, albeit one appropriate for Ramses' reign of terror. The creepily atmospheric "Kids Will Be Skeletons" could be a lullaby - if you want to induce bone-rattling nightmares. The eight-minute "Ratts of the Capital" begins with sensitively plucked guitars that eventually morph into a wall of wicked My Bloody Valentine-style white noise. The next track, the gentle "Golden Porsche," provides the perfect comedown, followed by the even gentler, almost minimalist "I Know You Are but What Am I?," which makes use of just a few choice chords on the piano - rather than the guitar - as its central figure. "Stop Coming to My House" closes the record on what is literally a disturbing note. If this album is Mogwai's idea of happy, I'd hate to hear how they'd express misery.

Death in Vegas: Scorpio Rising Death in Vegas' debut, 1999's "The Contino Sessions," was a bleak and fierce record that brimmed with spiky songs sung by the likes of Iggy Pop, Bobby Gillespie and Jim Reid. For their second release, DiV core members Richard Fearless and Tim Holmes have jettisoned at least some of the musical malevolence in favor of what they are calling an album of "psychedelic love songs" that look East - India, to be specific - for inspiration. Beginning with the buzz and crackle of the instrumental "Leather," "Scorpio Rising" hits a trippy groove that, unlike last time around, accentuates female voices over male (although Liam Gallagher and Paul Weller do make cameos). Adult's Susan Dillane's ahhs hover hauntingly over "Girls," Nicola Kuperas of Woodbine chips in a mechanical-sounding vocal on the Teutonic "Hands Around My Throat" and Hope Sandoval performs her best lugubrious murmur on "Killing Smile," whose plunky banjos and exotic strings tug and tear at the heart. Weller's rocking reading of Gene Clark's "So You Say You Lost Your Baby" seems to disrupt the mood, but then Indian superstar violinist Dr. Subramanian adds whorls of manic strings that could only be best appreciated in an altered state. Diverse as it is, the album comes together like a crazy bunch of hippies in a dreamed-of Westphalia.

Fog: Ether Teeth Fog ... the name couldn't be any more apt. Here's music that drifts in from out of nowhere and wraps itself around you while you are unawares. Here's music to get lost in. Described by band leader and sole member Andrew Broder as a "collision of turntables, piano, poetry and God knows what else," "Ether Teeth" is also all that's engaging and inventive about the Generation Laptop. Using otherworldly atmospherics, scratches and disembodied voices, Broder sculpts a multidimensional alternaverse that's unlike anything you've heard. There's the downbeat and delicate "See It? See It?" (in the middle of which is a painful little trumpet solo that sounds like Chet Baker in his final throes), the lopsided waltz "The Girl From the Gum Commercial," the sing-song loony tune "What a Day Day" and the strange-as-all-get-out "Apologizing to Mystery." And, oh yes, there's Broder's voice, which mewls and mumbles like a troubled spook. What to make of it? With its glutinous melodies and spiky moods, "Ether Teeth" is both liquid and solid. The feel funny album of the year.

Manitoba: Up in Flames Full of dusty breaks and dissonance but not without lambent beauty, "Up in Flames" is music that I thought could only be spun in dreams. Manitoba's Dan Snaith has a love of both familiar and foreign sounds and he has obviously spent many hours shaping them into new forms. The result is the backward-forward jar of "I've Lived on a Dirt Road All My Life," which whooshes past you like tomorrow never knows. With its crickets, wobbly sax and clanging drums, "Skunks" reeks of a swampy summer evening, while "Hendrix With KO" struts like a confident runway model, "Every Time She Turns Round, It's Her Birthday" fucks around with smeary beats and "Bijoux" rings as clear as, well, a thousand bells (and whistles). Imagine if Traffic never got over their psychedelic phase and had access to a sampler - that's "Up in Flames."