Gimme Fiction (2005)

With his nasal-drip singing and spazzed-out guitar playing, Spoon's Britt Daniel oozes hipster cool. On Gimme Fiction, his Austin band builds on the tension-breeding sparseness of 2002's acclaimed Kill the Moonlight. Strings swoon, falsetto voices sigh, and counterpoint piano lines glide. Yet nothing sounds fussy, which is why songs like ''Sister Jack'' and ''The Beast and Dragon, Adored'' come off as casual indie-pop classics-to-be.