M. Ward is probably best known since 2006 as the Him to Zooey Deschanel's She in retro-pop duo She & Him, but Ward's cred as a solo singer/songwriter goes way back, evolving from early lo-fi folk recordings to a much broader and more sonically diverse palette. A Wasteland Companion, his eighth studio album, draws on all of that experience, juxtaposing bare, finger-picked acoustic songs like "Clean Slate" or "There's a Key" with the expansive, Wall of Sound pop of "Primitive Girl" or the country-tinged "Sweetheart." There's more of the stripped-down stuff than the latter, but Ward's classicist songwriting chops and appealingly rich, raspy voice do both with ease, and even his simplest arrangements go unexpected places, like the ambient outro of wavering strings and reverberating space on the album's title track.

Eric Grandy, Google Play