If you're drawn to Battles' nimble melodic turmoil and general musical messiness, you may find some of these electro excursions to be hard work.

Black Is Beautiful is their most immediately accessible album, but its 15 tracks (14 of which are untitled) don't sound much like hits. Like its predecessors, this set works best taken as a whole, when its unstable collage has time to establish what turns out to be a powerful atmosphere.

As a tastefully populist exercise this set represents a job well done.

This chilled-out collection is an easy, pleasant listen, but it is far from an essential purchase for anyone except Florence completists.

Forget austere, bleak, slavishly traditional renditions – this is Roberts and Morrison we're talking about. These love and 'waulking' songs – one of them originally sung by women weaving tweed – are expansive, joyful, mysterious things.

This is a Spiritualized album down to its marrow, replete with the Velvet Underground-meets-Brian Wilson melodies, symphonic crescendos and widescreen riffs that Pierce has made his own since the beginning.... and [it's] a great one.

The sequencing seems illogical on first listen, but someone as dab-handed as Ward surely intended this, and the rollercoaster becomes easier to digest with each listen.

Downbeat words are buoyed up by light pop textures, leaning heavily for character on the fragile virtues of a voice that, while full of expression, is not designed for pop.

Cancer Bats haven't lost their swagger or even their appeal, but this is uneasy listening in every sense.

While diehard converts won't feel short-changed, others might wonder whether the duo could have sprung more surprises similar to the appearance of the Harlem String Quartet on the classical fantasia Mozart Goes Dancing.

It's a comfortable masterclass, in short, from a songwriter in complete command of his aesthetic.

It's a tight 40 minutes of compacted, runaway virtuosity.

Provides a vital, authentic taste of the United States, one steeped in history but simultaneously bang up-to-date.

Lyrics are route-one effective throughout, as you'd expect from an album called Boys & Girls, but the Shakes are not one-dimensional.

It's easy to hear that they spent upwards of two years putting this album together, because First Serve is all about the joy of sublime musicianship.

This is a fine album that warrants serious investigation from any and every rock circle.

Jokes are fairly hard to come by on a record chocked with sleepy, lilting stomp-alongs like these, but fortunately the gaps are filled by warmth, quality and not a little fiddle-playing.

Referring to Quakers as a collective is a touch disingenuous.... But, fresh and subtle spins on hip hop are sufficiently widespread throughout this set that it's just about the only complaint worth making.

The album unfolds an immeasurable amalgam of genres and inspirations, all fused together in a diamond-encrusted bubble of futuristic, day-glo hip hop. The energy is palpable, the pace rarely lets up, and personality pervades throughout.

This self-titled album is never less than pleasant, but only rarely is it truly memorable.

It assures us all that Meshuggah can still bury their copyists while leading the way when it comes to intelligent, thoughtful and undeniably brutal heavy metal.

More selective souls may find themselves reaching for the fast-forward button, as perhaps the original plan would have yielded a more cohesive whole.

Their music is full of joy, of sensuousness and sensuality, of acid wit and ambitious creativity.

Nobody would expect an eighth album by a band 20-plus years into its career to sound this fantastic, but time away has obviously helped re-energise the brothers into crafting this triumphantly grand return.

Some Clark fans will be disappointed with Iradelphic, but many others will see the promise in this little treasure.

Keaton Henson isn't a show off, but with talent like this, he has every right to be.

A timeless, anachronistic record, Barton Hollow could be from 30 years ago, or it could be from 30 years hence.

So while Rant may be a stunt album for The Futureheads, it's an exhilarating stunt, and one that more than whets the appetite for whatever it is they choose to do next.