Lana Del Rey is a femme fatale with a smoky voice, a languorous image, and a modeling contract. Not coincidentally, she didn't lack for attention leading up to the release of her Interscope debut, Born to Die. The hype began in mid-2011 with a stunning song and video for "Video Games," and it kept on rising, right up to her January 2012 performance on "Saturday Night Live" (making her the first artist since Natalie Imbruglia in 1998 to perform on "SNL" without an album available). Although it's easy to see why Del Rey got her contract, it's also easy to hear: her songwriting skills and her bewitching voice. "Video Games" is a beautiful song, calling to mind Fiona Apple to Anna Calvi as she recounts another variation on the age-old trope of female-as-sex-object. Her vacant, tired reading of the song rescues it from any hint of exploitation, making it a winner. [The Paradise Edition added a second CD for a total of 23 tracks.]

The third time around, Luke Bryan doubles down on his calling card: his inherent sweetness, the warmth he has as the country boy next door. Bryan is so genial that when he implores his country girl to “shake it for me,” there’s nary a trace of lasciviousness: he just wants to be sure she’s having a good time. This aw-shucks generosity resonates throughout Tailgates & Tanlines, a record that capitalizes on the relaxed professionalism of 2009’s Doin’ My Thing. Bryan’s bright setting plays as pop -- it’s too clean and crisp, too bereft of grit to ever be mistaken as something hardcore -- but his foundation is pure country, songs that are sturdy and unfussy, never bothering with sugary pop hooks. This is a slight shift from Doin’ My Thing, which was pop enough to have a OneRepublic cover fit within the context, but Bryan retains the shiny friendliness of his sophomore set and marries it to songs that are strictly country, whether they’re a lazy Sunday stroll like “Too Damn Young,” the country corn of “You Don’t Know Jack,” the farmtown anthem “Harvest Time,” the blues stomp of “Muckalee Creek Water,” or the open-road sprightliness of “Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye.” Much of this is modern in sensibility, anchored by subtle ties to the past, a deliberate move from Bryan both as a writer -- he had a hand in penning eight of the 13 tunes here -- and a performer, showing that he knows exactly what his strengths are: he’s not flashy yet he’s not boring, he’s laid-back and assured, a modern guy who knows his roots but is happy to be in the present, and it’s hard not to smile along with the guy as he sings.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi

There are dozens of Beach Boys compilations on the market, some of them thrown together in haphazard fashion with an eye to budget bins and gas station racks, and while all of them undoubtedly feature some great songs (given that the band's recorded legacy is such a rich and timeless one), it's a delight to find that Capitol Records is finally taking great care to re-present the Beach Boys catalog in 2012, the 50th anniversary of the band. That said, this new single-disc collection of 20 Beach Boys hits doesn't differ all that much from the compilations that came before it. It has a new track, "That's Why God Made the Radio," several cuts are featured in stereo versions, and it has the single-only mixes of "Be True to Your School" and "Help Me, Rhonda," for instance, but it still feels rather random, even though one couldn't quibble with the catalog songs here -- they're all classic Beach Boys tracks, and all of them received a ton of radio play in their day. It's hard to call a 20-track package a sampler, but that's what this incarnation of the band's greatest hits feels like. It's a measure of what a great band the Beach Boys have been, really. A single disc just can't cover it.

Even though Night Visions has several repackaged tunes from Imagine Dragons' previous EPs, including the instantly appealing breakthrough hit "It's Time," the band's debut LP is a confident, commercially savvy collection of energetic hooks, crunchy electro beats and glossy synthesizers. With sweeping choruses and booming bass, it's big-sounding party rock, but the savvy, kitchen-sink production of Alex da Kid makes other would-be singles like "Bleeding Out" and "Tiptoe" as interesting as they are overwhelming. Even though under all the layers there are occasionally pockets of pure cheese ("With the beast inside, there's nowhere we can hide," Dan Reynolds sings on "Demons"), the scope of the band's full-length debut leaves a big impression.

Nate Cavalieri, Google Play

Elements of Miguel's second album started to reach the public around the time "Lotus Flower Bomb," the singer's collaboration with Wale, began to overstay its welcome on mainstream urban radio. From late February 2012 through that April, Miguel released a trio of free three-song EPs dubbed Art Dealer Chic. Altogether, the material was funkier and weirder than that of All I Want Is You. The high points eclipsed that album's singles, and some out-there moments confirmed that the freaky and daring qualities of "Teach Me" were not simply dabblings. Kaleidoscope Dream includes some of the ADC songs in varying form, as well as the six songs from the July and September album-preview EPs. The small quantity of new material makes Kaleidoscope Dream anticlimactic for some. For them, the trade-off is that they heard the majority of 2012's most pleasurable pop-R&B album digital Advent calendar style. It leads with "Adorn," the singer's second solo number one R&B/Hip-Hop single; there's some atmospheric, mechanical/organic likeness to Marvin Gaye's 1982 ballad "Sexual Healing," but it trades lust for soul-bearing affection and carries some of the era's sweetest backgrounds and a knockout falsetto howl over probing but unobtrusive bass. That song and most of the others stay true to the album's title and maintain an illusory atmosphere. This sense is intensified by some unexpected touches, like an interlude where Miguel softly croons part of the Zombies' "Time of the Season" over synthesizer goo, and the hovering title track, which incorporates the bassline from Labi Siffre's "I Got The" (in a manner heavier than Eminem's "My Name Is") and some "Strawberry Letter 23"-like guitar swirls. There are instances where the lyrical content edges too close to "artsy" teenage erotic poetry, but no song is without an attractive quality, whether it's a heavenly melody, a riveting rhythm, or a boggling production nuance. The set is cunningly sequenced, too. The loose "Where's the Fun in Forever" -- atmospheric yet mostly drums and bass, with some cool and casual background vocals from Alicia Keys -- melts into ADC highlight "Arch & Point," which is something like a skeletal power pop number slowed to a seductively squalid prowl. In its new context, the back half of that combination sounds fresh. Miguel is listed first in the songwriting credits of each song, and he's involved with much of the production, but he gets valuable support from earlier associates Salaam Remi and Happy Perez, as well as the likes of Warren "Oak" Felder, Andrew "Pop" Wansel, Steve "Ace" Mostyn, and J*Davey's Brook D'Leau, whose baleful keyboards on the closing "Candles in the Rain" flirt with evil.

Andy Kellman, Rovi

The moment the gospel choir kicks in on ‘Ain’t It Fun’, urging some poor unfortunate to not go crying to their mother, signals that this is a Paramore album like no other. Following on from the breakup of the original line-up in 2010, singer Hayley Williams returns with a record that’s more commercial than ever, but unafraid to rock out the fuzzy guitars on tracks like ‘Now’ and ‘Part II’. Produced by Justin Meldal-Johnsen, who has worked with Garbage, Air and Nine Inch Nails, the album marries a bright, upbeat hyperactivity with Williams’ often downbeat lyrics to create a winning, No Doubt-style fusion of poppy highlights and sure-fire stadium hits such as ‘Still Into You, Grow Up’ and ‘(One of Those) Crazy Girls’.

Dave Pollock, Google Play

Sublime's eponymous major-label debut arrived a few months after the band's leader, Brad Nowell, died tragically of a heroin overdose. As a show of sympathy, the album tended to be slightly overrated in some critical quarters, who claimed that Nowell was an exceptionally gifted lyricist and musical hybridist, but Sublime doesn't quite support those claims. Even so, the trio does have a surprising grace in its unabashedly traditionalist fusion of Californian hardcore punk, light hip-hop, and reggae. Switching between bracing hardcore and slow, sexy reggae numbers, Sublime display supple, muscular versatility and, on occasion, a gift for ingratiatingly catchy hooks, as on the hit single "What I Got." What they don't have is the vision -- either lyrical or musical -- to maintain interest throughout the course of the entire album. Sublime sags when the band delves too deeply into their dub aspirations or when their lyrics slide into smirking humor. The low moments don't arrive that often -- by and large, the album is quite engaging -- but they happen frequently enough to make the record a demonstration of the band's blossoming ability, but not the fulfillment of their full potential. Of course, Nowell's death gives the record a certain pathos, but that doesn't make the album any stronger.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi

Beyoncé reportedly delivered over 70 songs to Columbia for her fourth solo studio album. The dozen that made the cut, combined with their sequencing, make it plain that straightforward crossover-dance singles and cohesion were not priorities. Taking it in at once is mystifying, even when little attention is paid to the lyrics. The opening “1+1,” a sparse and placid vocal showcase, fades in with a somber guitar line, throws up occasional and brief spikes in energy, and slowly recedes. It’s the kind of song one would expect to hear during an album’s second half, certainly not as the opener -- not with the (fittingly) slight sonics and heavy lines like “Just when I ball up my fist, I realize I’m laying right next to you, baby.” Three additional ballads follow. Each one features its own set of collaborators and contrasts both sonically and lyrically. “I Care” rolls in on pensive percussion and low-profile synthesizer drones, surging during a cathartic chorus. “I Miss You,” alluringly bleak and hushed, is a codependent confessional. The only one that’s rote, “Best Thing I Never Had” is a bombastic kiss-off saved by Beyoncé’s ability to plow through it. From there, the album restlessly bounces between tempos and moods: a desperate midtempo chest thumper, a couple cyborg marching-band dancefloor tracks, an ecstatic early-‘90s throwback, yet more ballads. What’s most surprising is that a song titled “Party,” co-produced by Kanye West with a guest verse from André 3000, quickly settles into a low-watt groove and remains there. Wildcard interludes and a Euro-pop party-anthem cash-in would be the only ways to make the album more scattered, but the strength of most of the material, propelled by Beyoncé’s characteristically acrobatic vocal skills, eases the trouble of sifting through the disjointed assortment. No one but one of the most talented and accomplished singers -- one with 16 Grammys, nothing left to prove, and every desired collaborator at her disposal -- could have made this album. [A Deluxe Edition was also released.]

Columbus, Ohio-based pop duo Twenty One Pilots spent the few short years leading up to Vessel, their debut recording for Atlantic Records subsidiary Fueled by Ramen, touring ceaselessly and reaching out to their growing fan base on a grassroots level. The emphatic pop stylings with more-than-occasional rap interjections made by Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun -- two Midwestern high-school friends who worked hard enough to build up something some people took notice of, still young and full of enough energy to keep up with the twists and turns once the major labels came knocking -- sound custom-made for the trajectory of their career up to this point. The move from rough demo versions on self-released recordings like 2011's Regional at Best to the glossy, radio-ready production of Vessel (handled by Greg Wells, who's also responsible for hits by Adele, Kid Cudi, Katy Perry, and others) seems like an entirely natural progression for the band's dorky rhymes that always run out just in time for an epically hooky chorus. Vessel is front-loaded with three relentlessly catchy single-ready standouts: the schizo-frenetic hip-hop via indie bounce of "Ode to Sleep," the silky groove of "Holding on to You," and the vocoder radio pop of "Migraine." These three songs encapsulate the band's unique calling card, offering up the best examples of what makes their approach different from any number of bands working in similar territory, with enormous beats and full-force electro-pop running through hooks modeled for Top 40 radio, each element punctuated by Joseph's down-to-earth sentiments coming through in the form of caffeinated rap codas. The continuity of the album isn't as strong after those first three songs. The influence of dour emo-pop like Bright Eyes shows up in some of the vocal stylings, as on "Semi-Automatic" and the uncharacteristically folky "House of Gold." The entire ride is more of a party than an emo-fest, though, and a decidedly more commercial take on the parts of indie rock that appeal to a mass market, with banging tunes like "Fake You Out" leaning closer to Coldplay or Fun. than they do to MGMT, but with an eye toward both sides of the coin. Twenty One Pilots definitely have a formula for both songwriting and production that renders some of the songs here slightly redundant, but even that doesn't take away from the overall value of the album. Vessel is a lively, energetic, pulsing collection of candy-coated big-budget pop with just enough personality to make it more engaging than a large percentage of other groups out there at the moment doing something similar.

Fred Thomas, Rovi

After releasing huge hits on Steve Aoki's Dim Mak and Skrillex's OWSLA labels, 23-year-old Zedd unleashes an album's worth of peak-time dance-pop gold. Most of these 10 tracks mesh heartfelt ballads with huge, clubby sounds: Ellie Goulding candy-coats the electrostep monster "Fall Into the Sky," Bright Lights sounds silvery over the soaring progressive house number "Follow You Down," and the title track melds Foxes' breakup lyrics, a men's chorus and huge drum buildups into a cheery dancefloor sing-along. If you prefer more hypnotic vibes, "Stache" and "Shave It Up" are heavy-hitting floor-fillers. With a surprising wealth of ideas and melodies for such a young producer, don't be surprised if Zedd is soon giving Deadmau5 and Swedish House Mafia a run for their money.

Vivian Host, Google Play