This column has spent a lot of time waxing on about the genius of Bob Dylan, especially lately, so I think it is wise to keep the review of the new record brief. In terms of sound and the crew Dylan has surrounded himself with, Modern Times has a direct link with his previous two releases, Time Out of Mind, and Love & Theft. Yet, though the title refers to the here and now, Dylan sounds more than ever like a traditionalist; an outcast at the edge of town, channeling the influences that initially brought him from the backwaters of Minnesota to New York City (namely Woody Guthrie, Leadbelly, and Sonny Terry). While the tempo of the music is upbeat with a real loose New Orleans-infused swing that ebbs and flows throughout the ten tracks, at its lyrical core, the record is a blues album that is as gloomy and dreary as it gets. Yet amidst all the doom and gloom, Modern Times is still one of the most accessible Dylan records in years, as the backing players, lead by skilled guitarist Denny Freeman, bring a little light to the dark shadows of Dylan's lyrical lament for the modern world.

M Ward - Post War

Aside from Neil Young's epic and outstanding new album Living With War, very few artists have been interested in tackling the war in Iraq. It is surprising that more people don't find it troubling that the only artist to weigh in on the topic is an old Canadian hippy, while younger contemporary voices remain largely silent. (Two major exceptions are records mentioned in previous columns, namely TV on the Radio's Return From Cookie Mountain and Bright Eyes' I'm Wide Awake It's Morning). As some country music fills the airwaves with über-patriotic rants by Toby Keith, one would expect a shot across the bow from those artists disturbed by the current goings-on.

Now comes the latest release from folk singer-songwriter M Ward. With a title like Post War you'd expect a folk singer like Matt Ward would be addressing the current political climate head on while looking forward to a bloodless future. Yet, Post War is a more personal record that has an aura of war that hovers over it as the songs survey the effects and aftermath of conflict. Ward laments the toll war takes on relationships, looking to the homecoming, and pondering in songs like "Chinese Translation, "what do you do with the pieces of a broken heart?"

This is Ward's first record where he has surrounded himself with a full backing band, giving the record a sense of grandeur and a rich sound that wasn't as prevalent on the more intimate and sparse earlier records (Transfiguration of Vincent and Transistor Radio). Accompanied by his friends like Jim James of My Morning Jacket and Neko Case, Ward creates lush harmonies and great sing-along hooks like "Magic Trick." Warm and accessible, but not heavy-handed or preachy, Post War is clearly one of the best singer-songwriter records of the year.

Pipettes – We Are the. . . (Memphis Industries)

The Pipettes, an English all girl group that recently released their debut album, provoking a lot of debate amongst critics due to their sugar-sweet sound and their indie-rock/ “riot girl” style. With their debut release We Are the Pipettes, the three-piece girl group has taken hints of the Spice Girls and all-girl groups from the golden era of Motown and merged the stylings of these groups with indie-rock lyrics.

To give you an example of the different opinions the group has incited, you can look no further than Pitchforkmedia.com, who proclaimed the record to be a classic “modern indie-pop album,” while the Village Voice shot back that the band “have talked their way into this party, and I suspect we will not notice when they have left.” To throw my two cents into the ring, I am clearly siding with the latter opinion, and here's why.

This Brighton three-piece band is all surface with very little substance, adopting early 60s bubblegum and the Phil Spector “wall-of-sound” to forge their sound and style, while tossing in pieces of feminist rhetoric. Yet the merger of these two is so poorly thought out it’s staggering to behold. While focus should be given to the songs on the record, the band’s biography on their website (thepipettes.co.uk) offers the clearest example of the group’s problems and raises questions about whether these girls are just the Spice Girls version 2.0.

The band’s biography is more of a mission statement, as they set out their opinions on the history of modern pop music, casting aside the Beatles and Elvis Presley as unimportant while bowing down in holy reverie to the God of Phil Spector: The band writes that “Spector took the promise of rock'n'roll and the new socioeconomic class of the ‘teenager’ at face value and ran with it. This was the real music that was important and valuable and serious and worth caring about. And anything was possible. So let's draw on the magic and the energy of this period that we might almost think of as a golden age: the Spector years, the Brill building, Joe Meek's Triumph recordings in England and beyond that, Motown, Stax, Studio One.”

While there is nothing wrong with hailing the music genius of Spector and channeling his influence into one’s musical style, it’s kind of funny that they’d condemn musicians like the Beatles while singing the praises of one of the most misogynistic, egomaniacal and violent men in pop history. It’s all the more ridiculous when you consider that the musicians making this Spector-inspired music on We Are the Pipettes are a couple of guys who remain anonymous behind the trio of polka dot-attired trio of singers. A merger of 60s era wall-of-sound pop with a contemporary challenge to sexual politics in music is an interesting and engaging take, yet Spector is not the person to channel. The new girl power group? I think not.