Miley Cyrus Ditched TV Name for New Studio Record

"Breakout" (Hollywood Records): It must be tough to be a 15-year-old girl with two names. That's the case for Miley Cyrus, who is more well known as the lead in the Disney series "Hannah Montana." The daughter of country singer Billy Ray Cyrus has released two solo albums in connection with the TV show, but "Breakout" is the first album with no relation to the show or the Hannah character.

Compared to "Identified," the recent solo record from Disney star Vanessa Hudgens, "Breakout" is an absolute masterpiece filled with saccharine, bubblegum pop that's as catchy as it is inconsequential. Opening with new wavey title track, Cyrus comes out of the gate sounding like the new frontwoman for The Go-Go's, which shouldn't be a surprise because that band's drummer, Gina Shock, co-wrote the song. It's instantly hummable.

In fact, the first three songs on "Breakout" all capture the boundless energy necessary to pull off an album of this type of teen pop. It's nonstop hooks. And then comes a cover of Cyndi Lauper's classic "Girls Just Want To Have Fun." As bad as a Cyrus take on this tune might sound on paper, this version works. Adding strings and big guitars and a late '80s vibe, the song manages to sound current and nostalgic and timeless all at once. Seriously.

But let's not start thinking Cyrus has made a great disc or anything. Starting with the fifth tune, "Full Circle," things start to proceed downhill. The tune is a bad Alanis knockoff, but it's nothing as close to as awful as "Fly On the Wall," a creepy, industrialrock-like song that wishes it could be Britney's "Toxic," but more closely approximates the worst Nine Inch Nails song ever, sung by a teenager.

There's a reason that teenagers need help writing songs, and that becomes perfectly clear with "Wake Up America," a painfully awful track about the environment. Cyrus has a good idea of what she wants to say, but says in the most facile and obvious way.

A couple decent songs do occupy the second half of "Breakout," but the bulk of those tunes are syrupy ballads that fail miserably. Nobody wants to hear a 15-year-old girl singing tunes Celine Dion would have passed up. It's hard to understand why producers would want to target an adultcontemporary audience with songs from a young woman. These tunes don't make sense.

Cyrus should be singing an entire record like the title track. It's fun, bouncy and perfect for young music fans. Her gravely voice fits well with rock, but, unfortunately, there's too many ballads and generic filler to make "Breakout" anything more than five good songs and seven to skip over.

Sugarland -- "Love on the Inside" (Mercury Nashville):

Country duo Sugarland knows how to write quality songs. Heck, Kristian Bush, the non-pretty blonde half of the group, used to make up one-half of Billy Pilgrim, the critically acclaimed folk duo that met its demise way too early. And Jennifer Nettles, the pretty blonde half, sure can sing. If Sugarland just knew how to pick a producer.

Too often the songs on "Love on the Inside," the duo's third studio record, are given a glossy sheen that makes them virtually indistinguishable from the glut of generic country music that's popular right now. You know, the kind of songs that take the same formula for '80s hair band hits and add a fiddle. On songs like the harmony-driven "We Run," this is particularly sad. The tune is the best track ever released by Sugarland, but would sound so much better without all the cliched accoutrements.

The acoustic "Genevieve" has a slight rocking vibe and, once again, it's the way that Bush and Nettles' voices mesh perfectly. These two were born to sing together. And "Genevieve" just begins a very obvious trend: When Sugarland keeps things quiet and stark, the band succeeds wildly. But when the two attempt to make a big country hit or a insipid ballad, things fail miserably. A quick listen to the Rascal Flatts-aping "Take Me As I Am" is enough evidence to prove that Sugarland wastes its talent when it tries to pen a big, bombastic single.

Besides "We Run," the best tune on "Love on the Inside" comes from "Steve Earle," a comedic ode to the great country singer/songwriter that probably vomits in his mouth every time he hears the generic slop passed off as country these days by bands like Rascal Flatts, Big & Rich and, sadly, sometimes Sugarland.

Nas -- "Untitled" (Def Jam):

You just never know what you're going to get when you pop in a new Nas record; he's been one of the most unpredictable hip-hop artists of the last couple decades. Maybe you'll find the serious rapper who debuted in 1994 with amazing and genre-defining "Illmatic," or maybe you'll hear the guy who didn't care about doing anything special and put out 2006's "Hip Hip Is Dead." Or maybe, just maybe, you'll get something in between. With "Untitled," you get the Nas who's releasing his best work since that 1994 debut.

Marked with controversy because the original title was supposed to be the "N" word, "Untitled" is a blast of a creativity, so full of sparse masterpieces that this could easily be considered one of the best discs of the year so far. A lone piano on the striking "Queens Get The Money" begins the record in a big way, only to move straight into the jazzy "You Can't Stop Us Now," just one of many tunes that surprises with simple arrangements.

But everything on "Untitled" isn't dry. There's a lot of fun to be had. On "Sly Fox," Nas takes aim at Bill O'Reilly, calling him a "visual cancer" with a "secret agenda. You see, O'Reilly called Nas out for giving a free concert at Virginia Tech in the aftermath of the shootings. You see, the rapper shouldn't have done it because he has "violent" lyrics. Um. Nas also attacks stereotypes on the timeless "Fried Chicken," which sounds a bit like "Gonna Fly Now" from the "Rocky" movies.

All in all, "Untitled" is the work we've been waiting for from Nas for a long time. Maybe controversy is what was needed to spark the creative juices in the rapper. Whatever the catalyst, it worked because "Untitled" works on every level.

Dr. Dog -- "Fate" (Park the Van Records): Few bands are a more obvious synthesis of their influences than Philadelphia's Dr. Dog, a quintet that is mixes The Beatles and The Band into one rock 'n' roll stew. And "Fate," the band's fifth album, is no different. It sounds exactly like Lennon and McCartney performing "Music from the Big Pink" or Robertson and Helm doing "Abbey Road."

The album is full of poppy songs that are more complicated than they sound. On "The Rabbit, The Bat & The Reindeer," a piano figure leads a track that will have your head buzzing for hours after a listen. Big harmonies play a huge part on the album, of course, but it's the instrumentation that makes Dr. Dog go.

Dr. Dog knows what old albums sound like, and that's why "Fate" sounds timeless, like a record made in the late '60s with today's instruments.

For 11 songs, the band ambles along with very good songs that aren't necessarily unique in any way, but still accomplish exactly what it wishes.