With the strongest indie breakthrough of the last two years, Irish hard folkie Damien Rice built a tremendous grassroots following around his live show, belying the quiet nature of his debut, O. The guy rocks, and his songs take on far greater power with the full-band arrangements that he brought to stages across the country. Little strains of this power made it out through import CD singles and their B-sides -- his "remix" of "Volcano," actually a re-recording, was the best B-side of the year. Now, in advance of a second album, which is probably a year away, the B-Sides EP provides a window into that emergent live power: "Woman Like a Man" builds to a breathtaking crescendo, Lisa Hannigan's angelic soprano showing signs of mortality, while the 1997 demo of "Volcano" brings the raw energy of the track back to its roots. The seven tracks on B-Sides prove that Rice's talent is not flash-in-the-pan. (ANDREW STRICKMAN)

Bruce Hornsby Halcyon Days (Columbia)

Bruce Hornsby went from an early run of piano-based singer-songwriter hits to a wildly eclectic period that included tours with the Grateful Dead and the 2002 Dave Matthews-gone-electronica album Big Swing Face. Halcyon Days is a winning balance of his tuneful and adventurous sides. Sting and Eric Clapton contribute to "Gonna Make Some Changes," Hornsby's strongest track in years, and Elton John turns up for the aptly named "Dreamland." But guests are just the icing; the inspired piano work in "Circus on the Moon" is pure Hornsby. And that's the best reason to celebrate these Halcyon Days. (DAVID WILD)

Northern State All City (Columbia)

"Hail Mary au contrary/I wrote the whole motherfuckin' rhyme dictionary," claims Hesta Prynn of Northern State. Actually, the Beastie Boys wrote the book on many of this Long Island trio's brainy one-liners. But on their second album, All City, the girls also dabble with G-funk on "Style I Bring" and team up with Pete Rock on the excellently salty "Time to Rhyme." Throw in a little Sex and the City ("I'm out with my girls like Sarah Jessica Parker"), and you have hip-hop for the modern fabulous woman. (LAUREN GITLIN)

Various Artists Future Soundtrack for America (Barsuk)

Organized by John Flansburgh of They Might Be Giants as a fundraising project for progressive organizations like MoveOn.org, Future Soundtrack for America is raw and inspiring, a populist protest record that should silence the mumblings of all the haters who claim that Generation X, Y, et al, are only worth as much as their X-boxes and cell-phone tones. The sentiments are wide-ranging -- from Michael Stipe's quietly determined "Final Straw" to David Byrne's bittersweet "Ain't Got So Far to Go" to Ben Kweller's blatant "Jerry Falwell Destroyed Earth." They Might Be Giants' "Tippecanoe and Tyler" is an oddball gem, and Will.I.Am of the Black Eyed Peas brings a welcome dose of hip-hop with his succinct "Money." But the clincher is the finale, the first song to be released posthumously from Elliott Smith, "A Distorted Reality Is Now a Necessity to Be Free." To hear Smith's voice again is like getting a letter from a long-lost friend, a friend as distant now as pre-9/11 America. (MARGARET WAPPLER)

Mike Watt The Secondman's Middle Stand (Columbia/Red Ink)

This is a difficult album. From the traumatic instance that inspired it -- Watt suffered an internal abscess in his perineum that could have killed him -- to the adventurous prog-rock that executes it, this is a concept album that does not go down easy -- unless, of course, endless repetitions of the phrase "Pissbags and Tubing" sung in strangulated harmony appeals to you. The legendary alt-rock bassist, who established his reputation with the Minutemen and their brevity, stretches things to the limit. Recorded in four days with a sparse trio of drums, bass and organ, the album's nine tracks all sprawl over the five-minute mark and feature musical passages that sound like a cross between Jethro Tull and Uriah Heep practicing their scales. All this accompanies Watt's unflinching step-by-step analysis of his illness and recovery. On one hand, it's a brave experiment; on the other, it's an incredibly self-indulgent disaster. (ROB O'CONNOR)

Head Automatica Decadence (Warner Brothers)

Daryl Palumbo has spent the last few years shrieking out his angst in the Long Island hardcore band Glassjaw. But for Head Automatica, a dance-rock collaboration with producer Dan the Automator (Beck, Dr. Octagon), Palumbo turns his violent frown upside down. Now his veiled threats come off more like an invitation than a warning. During "Young Hollywood," he yelps, "I wanna fuck you in your God's hands when your praying bites the dust," and his rant is balanced by a groovy old-school hip-hop beat and a fuzzy guitar riff. The rest of Decadence is exactly what the title suggests, brimming with reggae beats, garage-rock tumult and Palumbo going on about discotheques, dance parties and people who done him wrong. Its retrofunky grooves are slinky, sexy and very now. They also prove a point: Sometimes, angry white boys just gotta dance. (KIRK MILLER)

Ryan Cabrera Take It All Away (Atlantic)

The man that brought you Jessica and Ashlee -- their dad -- now delivers twenty-year-old Ryan Cabrera. Joe Simpson may have developed Cabrera and become his manager, but it's Ashlee who gave Cabrera something to sing about on his debut. The pair broke up as their albums neared completion. The young Texan seems intent on transcending his Diesel-wearing, mall-kid status and being taken seriously as a musician. Take It All Away is about girls -- a mixture of teen angst ("Echo Park") and raging hormones (the clever "Shame On Me"). Cabrera lyrically demonstrates an assured sense of self, but the album's impact is blunted by slick production from Goo Goo Dolls leader John Rzeznik (who clones his band's radio-safe pop-rock sound). Cabrera's themes are often rough around the edges, and ditching the multi-layered studio sheen for a more organic sound would have greatly helped in communicating them. (PETE GLOWATSKY)

The Presidents of the United States of America Love Everybody (PUSA Music)

The Presidents of the United States of America scored a couple of quirky alt-pop hits in the mid-Nineties ("Lump," "Peaches"), then promptly disappeared. Their first album since 1997 makes a convincing case that they've spent the past seven years in a deep freeze: Their tastes, interests and sensibility sound largely unchanged. Frontman Chris Ballew acknowledges as much on "Some Postman," shouting "1993!" apropos of nothing, in the middle of his punchy chronicle of a mail carrier with a penchant for reading other people's love letters. Elsewhere, fuzzy, insistent leads from Ballew's two-string bassitar power jaunty tunes like "Love Everybody" and "Poke and Destroy." Deep thinking is consistently spurned in favor of unrelenting silliness: "Highway Forever" manages to make a snarling, punkabilly strut sound dorky (think the Doors' "Roadhouse Blues" double-timed by Devo); "Jennifer's Jacket" is a folky acoustic ode to some girl's ratty coat. It's all perfectly agreeable, if not exactly worth waiting seven years for. (DAVID PEISNER)

Twelve Girls Band Eastern Energy (Platia Entertainment)

China's endearing Twelve Girls Band could be considered an East Asian Polyphonic Spree. After all, a dozen girls playing sweeping songs, wearing white gowns and bright smiles, resembles the Spree's recipe. But the comparison ends there. On Eastern Energy, their second, these girls glide through a pop-Asian landscape that sounds like some sort of epic soundtrack; they layer classic Chinese instruments -- the erhu, a two-stringed Chinese fiddle, and the dizi, a bamboo flute, for example -- over drums and electronics for fourteen rambling expanses, including two Enya covers. The tunes are exotic (at least to us), instrumental-only and lush, as melodies dance, flutter and crash, at once inspirational and funny. But the mostly traditional Chinese songs have won them, oddly enough, a huge following in Japan -- their debut has sold over 2 million copies there. Still, the highlight has to be the dozen's version of Coldplay's "Clocks," an enthralling, strange rendition destined for fetish property. (BENJAMIN FRIEDLAND)

Devin the Dude To tha Extreme (Rap-A-Lot)

Devin the Dude is the most talented gangsta working today. Self-deprecating, tuneful and operating outside of the stone-faced, chain-flashing rap contingent that rules the airwaves, he is also one of the most criminally overlooked. Unfortunately, Devin representing Houston, Texas, hasn't had the same romanticized resonance as Jay-Z repping Brooklyn's Marcy housing projects. On To tha Extreme, Devin eschews the trappings of the cocksure rap star for the playful, mundane existence of scraping by in hip-hop America. On the loping G-funk of "Unity," Devin calls out his own insecurities, while "Too Cute" is a reversal of the typical mack-daddy ballad wherein vocalist Erica Marion croons "shut up boy" to all of Devin's advances. Even the more straightforward sex raps and weed odes are full of refreshing humor and humility. Devin's raw talent, coupled with star turns on tracks by Dr. Dre and Dilated Peoples might mean that Devin won't be a Texas secret for long. (STEPHEN CHRISTIAN)

Teedra Moses Complex Simplicity (TVT)

Throughout her engaging debut, newcomer Teedra Moses wins listeners over with a playful, hip-hop-soul vibe that recalls the music of Faith Evans and Monica. The New Orleans native and Los Angeles transplant uses her quietly plaintive vocals to paint vivid lyrical portraits of her 'round the way girl struggles, most notably on the elegantly melancholy "Be Your Girl"; the up-tempo "You'll Never Find (A Better Woman)" -- featuring Jadakiss as the curbed lover who'd rather hug blocks than embrace his honey; and the Jill Scott-reminiscent "No More Tears." Although Moses momentarily falters with the requisite booty-call track "Backstroke," she rebounds on the classic-soul-inspired gem "Take Me," an orchestral ballad with Raphael Saadiq, and the jazzy "I Think of You (Shirley's Song)," a poignant dedication to her mother. With the compelling Complex Simplicity, Moses' easily makes her mark as a new R&B force to reckon with. (TRACY E. HOPKINS)

Griffin House Lost & Found (Nettwerk)

The guitar riff dripping in digital delay, not unlike Unforgettable Fire-era U2, makes for a dramatic opener of Griffin House's debut. Lest you think twenty-four-year-old House is on some Eighties nostalgia trip, though, the effects roll back by the second track in favor of sparse acoustic accompaniment, bare-bones drums and vocals so earnest that they flirt with flatness. By the third song, "Tell Me a Lie," Lost & Found is as captivating melodically as it is lyrically ("Dressing my voice up on the phone/Underneath the envy rotting my bones . . . You can blame it on the stuff that I drank and the pills that I took"). From contemplative folk ("Why Won't You Believe?") to rickety near-rockabilly ("The Way I Was Made"), House's voice proves resilient as it follows the dynamics of each tune. Hopefully, on his next disc it'll be more Jeff Buckley and less Bono. (MEREDITH OCHS)