Marrying the Mainstream

9. Snow Patrol, Final Straw (A&M). In the wrong hands, lyrics about relationships tend to take on a black-or-white dichotomy -- love or heartbreak -- that reduces them to WB melodrama. Final Straw, on the other hand, thoughtfully explores the everyday minutiae involved in warts-and-all courtship: deception, shyness, ecstasy and uncertainty, for starters. The intelligent verbal sparring is matched with twee-on-testosterone riffs, percussive flourishes, new-wave grooviness and grungy Sebadoh-isms -- the latter largely thanks to Gary Lightbody's uncanny vocal resemblance to Lou Barlow.

10. Various Artists, Garden State Soundtrack (Epic). Even if you didn't see the movie -- a group hug to adrift, self-medicating twenty-somethings -- you can still find transcendence in its tunes. A Big Chill soundtrack for the iPod generation, Garden State captures the humbling romantic desperation and frustrated ennui of post-college living. Classic folk ditties by Nick Drake and Simon and Garfunkel anchor more modern examples of poetic vulnerability: Iron & Wine deconstructs the Postal Service with breathy melancholia, Frou Frou trip-hops through a tribal electronica freefall, and -- oh, yes -- the Shins just might change your life with their coffeehouse strummer "New Slang."