Scandinavia, waiting for someone to holler, “B8!” AMANDA PETRUSICH

Little Brother Getback ITUNES MYSPACE Tarheel survivors spit fire despite major-label washout

These underground hip-hop stalwarts could’ve crumbled after their disastrous stint on Atlantic (2005’s bitterly combative flop The Minstrel Show) and the loss of producer 9th Wonder. Reduced to a duo, Phonte and Big Pooh instead sound feisty and determined, with keen observations on the mundane yet crucial aspects of everyday black life. They remember struggling to cop “Good Clothes” as broke teenagers, and on “Two Step Blues” pay homage to old folks in the club wearing “Stacy Adams and a sweater.” Such lyrical details make for a triumphant rebirth. As Phonte puts it, “I refuse to be hip-hop’s pallbearer.” MOSI REEVES

“Lionkiller” flies the psych-folk flag both lyrically and vocally, with McCombs barking, “I am called Scorpio” in the midst of a twisted autobiography. On “Full Moon or Infinity,” he’s gently Elliott Smith–like. All the unexpected turns are usually pleasant and/or intriguing, but McCombs rarely stays in one mode long enough to find something truly compelling. JOSH MODELL

9th Wonder Dream Merchant, Vol. 2 ½ ITUNES MYSPACE Little Brother’s former big brother produces new brood Savvily dipping into ’70s soul and R&B samples, 9th Wonder has produced ace tracks for Jay-Z, Mary J. Blige, Destiny’s Child, and his ex-group Little Brother. But this showcase for countless, relatively unknown MCs is a lot to sift through. While distinctive, 9th’s style rarely strays beyond boom-bap territory. And the quality of the tracks ranges from jewels like “Shots,” where Sean Price and Big Dho ruminate about gun-obsessed rappers over lush strings, to unremarkable cuts like Camp Lo’s “Milky Lowa,” which drones on and on like a bad funk metronome. MOSI REEVES

Luckyiam Most Likely to Succeed ITUNES MYSPACE Eloquent diary of a long-suffering underground MC

As cofounder of West Coast hip-hop crew Living Legends, Luckyiam enjoys an indie-cult status comparable to that of Sage Francis and Atmosphere. The latter appears here with Aesop Rock on “Borrowedtime,” but the spotlight stays on Lucky’s sharp, emotionally charged lyrics. He depicts his native Los Angeles as a city of broken families, broken relationships, and nearly broken dreamers. His languid flow leavens the soulfully bleak material: “Memory Loss” humbly details his failings as an absentee father, and “ Dynamics of Duos” bittersweetly illustrates the disintegration of his group Mystik Journeymen. MOSI REEVES

The Most Serene Republic Population ½ ITUNES MYSPACE Like a band-room closet joyfully crammed with ideas This orchestral art-pop sextet from the Toronto suburbs up the triumphant racket on their second album, sounding as if labelmates Broken Social Scene recruited Polyphonic Spree’s Tim DeLaughter and his giddy cohorts to sing and shout along. Except for one capable foray into cool jazz (“A Mix of Sun and Clouds”) and one somnambulant string interlude (“Agenbite of Inwit”), these tracks are more concerned with mass than melody. Barely-there intros rise into warm, weighty epics, cluttered impressively with a clamoring assortment of keyboards, rallying horns, whispering reverb, and other (sometimes literal) bells and whistles. JULIA SIMON

Scout Niblett This Fool Can Die Now ½ ITUNES MYSPACE Fascinating diary of a (slightly) mad Cat Power fan

Any honest appraisal of Emma “Scout” Niblett must acknowledge PJ Harvey and Cat Power, both of whom started their careers on the same fertile, dangerous edge that Niblett inhabits. For her fourth album, the Brit singer/songwriter still gets gratingly shrill when the mood strikes, but she takes gentle steps toward sunnier pastures—particularly on four duets with a far-less-affected-than-usual Will Oldham. She’s best when simmering, not boiling, as on the beautifully bleak “Elizabeth (Black Hearted Queen)” and the funny, striking “Dinosaur Egg,” where she forcefully coos, “I’d much rather be a golden ball of light / But still have sex.” JOSH MODELL

Robert Pollard Coast to Coast Carpet of Love ½ Standard Gargoyle Decisions ½ ITUNES MYSPACE More hits than misses from indie rock’s workaholic uncle With more than a dozen solo albums—not to mention the entire Guided by Voices oeuvre and assorted side projects (Circus Devils, Acid Ranch, Keene Brothers, et al.)—Robert Pollard has had serious quality-control issues. But the 33 tracks on this pair of discs are uniformly excellent. Best bets: the lacerating “The Killers,” which connects the dots between Thin Lizzy and XTC, and the hypnotic folk rock of “Miles Under the Skin.” Propelled by a goose-bump-inducing chorus, the latter is a good argument for Pollard to open Springsteen’s next tour. SHANNON ZIMMERMAN

“You keep ’em ridin’
dirty. I’m done.”
Top 40 Hangover
Houston MC stumbles back to square one
Chamillionaire
Ultimate Victory ½
ITUNES MYSPACE

down. (This time around, targets include Bill O’Reilly, George W. Bush, Michael Richards, and Don Imus.) But Cham gets distracted by money an awful lot. He spends more than half the album bragging about his ability to get cash (“Won’t Let You Down”) and how he spends it (“Ultimate Vacation”). These are Ultimate Victory’s most swing-and-miss moments.

He gets distracted by
money an awful lot.

JONATHAN MANNION

Cass McCombs Dropping the Writ ITUNES MYSPACE Magpie songwriter anxiously pays tribute to his indie peers

Cass McCombs’ third album wrestles Devendra Banhart’s methodical mystery, the Sea and Cake’s jazzy smoothness, and straight-ahead ’70s Cali pop into one scattered, restless package. Insistent album opener

Prefuse 73 Preparations ½ ITUNES MYSPACE It’s a twisted avant breakbeat thing—you wouldn’t understand

On Guillermo Scott Herren’s latest techno/hip-hop excursion as Prefuse 73, he chops computer beats into a white-hot flurry of B-boy breaks, crashing percussive noise, and loopy folk-hop beats. Sometimes his productions coalesce into recognizable songs like the magnificent “Prog Version Slowly Crushed”; other times, as with “Aborted

In hip-hop, the only thing worse than not having a hit is actually having one. Case in point: Amid the blowup of the Houston syrup scene that delivered bangers from Paul Wall and Slim Thug, Chamillionaire clubbed everybody with “Ridin’,” a bombastic tune that became 2006’s unofficial summer jam. So ubiquitous was the singsongy hook that it became the biggest-selling ringtone of all time and somehow made everybody think verse-dropping guest Krayzie Bone was worth a damn.

But Ultimate Victory shows Cham now struggling. A wildly talented rhymer, he’s capable of a slow-rolling cadence or double-time tongue-twisting, and is at his best cutting people

In fact, it takes 18 songs before the real Chamillionaire shows up, on the title track’s breathless three minutes of hunger and no chorus. Cham’s strength is not songwriting— he admits, “This ain’t even a song / This is a beat I must release therapy on.” It’s not a fatal flaw, but it makes this less an ultimate victory and more like a bronze-medal fizzle. KYLE ANDERSON