Mark Eitzel and Peter Buck are any true music fan's dream collaboration. In fact, when I first heard that the former American Music Club frontman and R.E.M.'s melody maker were writing together, I smiled for an hour. And when the wait was over and the disc was spinning off genius, I smiled all day.

Eitzel's solo debut, 60 Watt Silver Lining, was indeed a great album -- one of 1996's best -- but some fans considered it too jazzy for their tastes. Those longtime fans can relax. The highly anticipated sophomore solo album from Eitzel is everything an AMC aficionado had hoped for and more. West is a return to form and no record in Eitzel's history has ever been as beautiful or memorable.

Eitzel's painful, heavy-hearted lyrics are more vivid than ever ("Your clothes were made for dolls / You're clothed in sorrow / Like your silence") and Buck's arresting melodies not only compliment the mournful stories, but amplify them. Together, the two have created something so flawless and shimmering, you actually question its tangibility. But West is undoubtedly real and a truly phenomenal piece of work.

-Ryan Schreiber