The Avalanches

Anyone with a sampler can create a new song out of bits and pieces of existing music, but it takes real panache to balance the familiar and obscure. Since I Left You, the first album from Australian quintet the Avalanches, strikes that balance perfectly. Composed of hundreds of samples, the disc's playful, airy grooves are ecstatic with the endless possibilities of sound, evoking the Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique refracted through the rave- kissed bliss of Primal Scream's "Loaded." What sticks, though, is the disc's surprisingly resonant emotional core, which explores the thrill and dread of leaving a stifling relation-ship and entering the wider world—in this case, the night world of club culture—in order to find your-self. (MICHAELANGELO MATOS)

From 2004's The New Rolling Stone Album Guide