@#%&*! Smilers

Aimee Mann is the most conservative musician P.T. Anderson has ever taken cues from, but that shouldn't make her the least respected. In the pop-classicist vein, she's emerged as the fabled "songwriter's songwriter"—a polite euphemism for someone whose well-constructed dirges run deep, but aren't attention-grabbing,…

Arguably, Aimee Mann hasn't released a simple collection of songs since her 1999 breakthrough with the Magnolia soundtrack and its cousin, Bachelor No. 2.

Aimee Mann’s sixth studio album proper, @#%&*! Smilers, sounds much like the rest of her solo catalog.

Because Aimee Mann is one of the two or three most consistently excellent pop musicians working today, a misstep from an artist of her calibre is generally...