Music: The Hot Rock: Sleater-Kinney

The songs on this new album come at you like an intervention: there is venting, there are surges of emotion, but, all said, the goings-on have a determined focus. Here the rock trio displays new command over its material: there are a few songs that are more about velocity than impact, but singer-guitarists Corin Tucker and Carrie Brownstein play off each other well both instrumentally and vocally. Several of the songs feature deft countermelodies with secondary vocal themes threading around the central one. In fact, this cerebral album itself is a striking countermelody to the junk that now passes as Top-40 rock.

–By Christopher John Farley