Lloyd Cole

Lloyd Cole caught a lot of people's attention with 1982's RATTLESNAKES, his debut record with backing band the Commotions. The dour-voiced Cole wrote dark, literate pop songs that managed to reference Arthur Lee, Norman Mailer, and Eva Marie-Saint without sacrificing his prodigious musicality. The debut was lauded by critics, but Cole never quite broke through to the masses. In the '90s, Cole left his native England and came to New York, where he recorded some of the best work of his career with backing by various luminaries of the downtown New York scene, including Robert Quine and Fred Maher.

• pop