Black Kids
Partie Traumatic
Ag/Columbia

Anyone expecting the debut release from the Black Kids to live up to the breathless hype that was lavished upon them in the past year may end up disappointed by Partie Traumatic. Anyone who is willing to take the band on their own terms and just listen to the music will be in for a treat. The group's youthful energy, their rambunctious performances (captured ably by producer Bernard Butler) and most of all, Reggie Youngblood's songs combine to make the album one of the better '80s influenced albums released in the past few years.

David Bowie
Live in Santa Monica '72
EMI

Long the province of bootleggers and semi-legal releases, David Bowie's Live In Santa Monica '72 finally gets an official release this week. Recorded at Bowie's first American radio broadcast, this finds the Spiders from Mars at a near-peak as a band, eclipsing the soundtrack to the Ziggy Stardust & The Spiders From Mars movie and arguably standing as Bowie's best live album.

CSS
Donkey
Sub Pop

CSS made a name for themselves by cranking out raw, sometimes trashy songs about art, sex and music, so it’s more than a little surprising that the band sounds so cleaned up and respectable on most of their second album. Polished instead of rough, thoughtful instead of brash, Donkey has a few songs that capture CSS’ old magic and a few that move the band’s sound forward, but a lot of the album feels like an odd and slightly disappointing move from a group that didn’t necessarily need to change its direction.

Miley Cyrus
Breakout
Disney

Breakout is the first album Miley Cyrus has released without her alter ego Hannah Montana’s name attached to it, but it doesn’t sound remarkably different than Hannah’s sunny, guitar-driven pop. There are a few more ballads and a couple of nods to country, but musically speaking, this isn’t much of a breakout. That may be a savvy move on Disney’s part, however – Breakout manages to give Hannah fans a fix and move Miley ever so slightly closer to a pop music career under her own name.

Nine Inch Nails
The Slip
Null Corporation

This week sees the physical product release of Nine Inch Nails' The Slip, Trent Reznor's surprise release from May this year. Following the dense conceptual Year Zero and the instrumental clearinghouse Ghosts, The Slip is the opposite of both records: it's tight, muscular and relentless, the most vigorous music Reznor has made in years.

U2
Boy [Deluxe Edition]
Island/Interscope/Universal

U2's first three albums -- 1980's Boy, 1981's October and 1983's War -- receive the deluxe reissue treatment this week, with each album expanded to a double-disc set overseen by the Edge. Each set has a bonus disc of rare material, including previously unreleased songs and non-LP singles that are seeing their first-ever appearance on CD. While some of the music is a little shaky, all three sets are superbly done and such a deluxe reissue campaign for U2 is long overdue.

Paul Weller
22 Dreams
Island

Paul Weller's magnum opus 22 Dreams sees a stateside release this week. An old-fashioned double album, sprawling out over two CDs and tied together by a loose concept, 22 Dreams is Weller's most ambitious record in years and it's also one of his best, as it finds him opening up to collaborations -- Robert Wyatt, Graham Coxon and Noel Gallagher all are involved -- and reconnecting to his adventurous spirit.