(FORTUNE Magazine) – Shelby Lynne Love, Shelby Island

It's amazing what a Grammy can do. Lynne's previous CD oozed raw country heartache. On Love, Shelby she still croons wonderful love-gone-wrong songs, but she's gotten all Sade on us--her twang replaced by one too many coats of studio sheen. Chalk it up as a good effort that could have been great.

Radiohead I Might Be Wrong: Live Recordings Capitol

Lately, Radiohead has come off like the rock & roll equivalent of The Wizard of Oz's Tin Man: no heart. But here, in front of an audience and stripped of all the fancy-pants electronic lacquer, the band seems born again. In addition to the usual brains and courage, there's also a big beating ticker.

Superchunk Here's to Shutting Up Merge

For a decade now, Superchunk has repeatedly proven itself to be the best thing to break out of Chapel Hill since Michael Jordan. Its latest doesn't shake up its indie rock formula too much, which is just fine: hummably-catchy power pop spiked with squalls of arsenic-bitter guitar hooks.

System of a Down Toxicity Columbia

First, a disclaimer: This is not easy-listening music. But unlike most of the dumb-and-dumber thrash-metal bands stomping around the Billboard charts, these lockstep Armenian metalheads are as smart as a whip--and their fiery lyrics sting like one too. The thinking man's Slayer.

The Velvet Underground Bootleg Series Volume 1: The Quine Tapes Polydor

If you thought these gritty street poets were the antithesis of the sunbeamy Grateful Dead, guess again. On a three-disk set of muddy live recordings, Lou Reed & Co. knock out byzantine space jams that would make Jerry Garcia green.