In Brief

On her stark debut album (in stores Tuesday), the daughter of L.A. filmmaker Allison Anders keens plaintive, folky heartbreak ballads with subtle melodic variations that are carefully finessed by alt-rock goddess PJ Harvey, making her own debut producing another artist. (Anders also has a famous drummer, Dinosaur Jr.’s J Mascis.) Her songs exclusively ache and bleed, with college-journal-style poetic imagery that reinforces the romantic agony. Mournful, but soul-cleansing.

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Albums are rated on a scale of one star (poor), two stars (fair), three stars (good) and four stars (excellent). The albums are already released unless otherwise noted.