It's coarse, awkward and at times lacks air; but the stubborn nature of Splazsh's development leaves you parched for more.

Collapse into Now genuinely feels like their first post-Bill Berry album to resemble a four-legged dog. And that, folks, is an event.

The reason that such a potentially pointless enterprise in trash retro works lies entirely in Lidell’s extraordinary talents as musician and producer.

Mercer's gently off-beam pop songs are lit up colourfully by the duo's choice of arrangements.

The scattered approach showcased on this set needs polish and original thought to develop.

Social Distortion are clearly unhurried by the passage of time and passing trends. And it shows, as this is a fine addition to their canon and proves they're full of a very important quality: life.

It may be time to tinker next time around, but right now he's redeemed an awful lot of himself.

Although not musically revolutionary, Tron: Legacy suggests the adrenaline rush of a black panther roaming nearby in the darkness, heard but not yet seen.

As such it is an understated and subtlety magnificent pleasure.

Just like its predecessor, Constellations’ unfussy panoramas may initially seem a little too polite, just a tad too restrained for some, but repeated listening will unravel hidden seams of loveliness.

The Dark Crawler shows just how varied a grime album can actually be.

Peggy Sue have firmly moved from kooky and wonky soul-smith-stresses to blazing a path through fully realised songs waging war with life.

Hope is their third studio album and touted as their step up. In truth, it comes on in leaps and bounds as much as it trips and stumbles along the way.

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.

The Bloom and the Blight builds on the band's strengths and successfully maintains their idiosyncrasies, offering persuasive evidence that they are more than ready to step up a level themselves.

Haley is not attempting anything revolutionary on Galactic Melt, but he demonstrates a sight more depth than a lot of stuff that's been tagged as chillwave.

With O, Markus Pop has reinvented Oval using new techniques to produce a challenging sound world that's simultaneously exhausting and fascinating.

It's full of fascinating, stirring moments, but overall, Year of the Black Rainbow suffers just a little too much from its own grand, sprawling ambition.

Rooms Filled With Light never dips beneath beguiling. Most of the time it's really quite grand.

An impressive document of a band in full Krautrock-psychedelia-horrorprog flow.

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

Braxton's sixth album Pulse--some five years in the making--is certainly a release shrouded with anticipation, but instead of sticking to her strength in ballads it feels more a trend-chasing American Idol semi-finalist's debut offering.

It’s all quite understated and beautifully played, and any shortcomings in the material are more than made up for by Drever’s peerless singing.

Some will call it noise, others a beautifully complicated symphony. In the end, you're not quite sure where you've landed, but you're glad you took the trip.

Prepare to be smitten all over again, as the NYC outfit release a brilliant fourth album.

These are warm, appealing tunes with no false bluster or crass anthemism, light years ahead of the bombastic drivel certain peers have offered up this year. The Charlatans are old fashioned, maybe even a little antiquated. But are they past it as songwriters? No way.

One Second of Love is arresting from the outset, Gonzalez's airily velveteen vocals cascading in with a similar invitingly icy inflection to St Vincent on Surgeon while luscious, Eyes Without a Face-esque keyboard washes burble by on their way to a skippily abrupt, if recoverable, meltdown.

It seems that the band still have plenty to say, and the means to say it well.