(FORTUNE Magazine) – U2 All That You Can't Leave Behind Interscope

Good news from the Emerald Isle: Bono & Co. have finally snapped out of their delusional flirtation with icky techno fluffery and returned to their bread and butter--plaintive white-boy soul shimmering with delicious guitar riffs. Welcome back from the abyss.

The Waco Brothers Electric Waco Chair Bloodshot Records

Okay, so they're not really brothers, nor do they actually hail from Waco, but the Chicago alt-country band's name pretty much sums up the kind of twangy, roadhouse rock & roll you'll find on their latest disk--blue-collar juke music that's as cool as a Bud longneck.

Johnny Cash American III: Solitary Man American Recordings

Having recently stared death in the face and flipped it the bird, the Man in Black gives Tom Petty's "I Won't Back Down" a previously untapped force. Armed with his signature baritone and doomed pathos, Cash has turned out one of the most haunting records of the year.

The Chameleons Strip Paradiso

How bands like the Cure and Echo and the Bunnymen managed to crack the Top 40 in the late '80s while the Chameleons didn't remains one of pop's unsolved mysteries. On this gorgeous unplugged CD--their first effort in more than a decade--the squalling Brits craft mini-symphonies that'll sound new even to longtime fans.

Brand New Heavies Trunk Funk Classics (1991-2000) Rhino

If the folks at Paramount had any smarts, they would've made this the soundtrack for The Ladies Man. With their come-hither mix of '70s-style sugar-daddy funk and foxy, hot-buttered soul, the Brand New Heavies swing like the silk-clad offspring of Barry White and Donna Summer.