There are good ideas scattered about on the record, but when you have to pass through several minutes of cacophonous effects and layers of sound, it can get a little exhausting.

The version the band have made is still a solid, if not rather good, Kaiser Chiefs album. [Review of UK release The Future Is Medieval]

Future This is stuck in some kind of awful, awful limbo between Robert Smith-less Cure and hyperbolic electro dance music.

As said, the songs benefit from being taken out of context and as much as that leads to just picking and choosing the moments worth going back for, the process of listening to the EP as a whole can almost be disheartening as much as it is unrewarding.

Unless you really enjoy music in commercials, you should avoid this disc.

Descriptors are hardly necessary for any of these songs because they're all a stone's toss from one another in pretty much every respect.

They start off well, though, with a trio of solid tracks.... The remaining tracks on the album are equally inoffensive, but they don't have the same half-minded unassuming appeal to help them glide along, and too often there's one too many head-in-your-hands cheesy lines thrown in.

Detractors have long said that Harris’ music is tailor made for background summer playlists you can ignore – listening to this project, it’s hard to disagree.

Ritual is an enthralling album, highlighting a band flexing their musical muscles, trying to grow and add new sounds to their existing palette.

From an MC that would call himself King, shouldn't we all have hoped – nay, expected – well, better?

She enlists help from guest artists and DJs to encapsulate the past six years – but there’s no innovation or originality.

With a collection of songs largely indistinguishable from one another, this album exemplifies the struggle up-and-coming rappers currently face.

At the end of the day, The Coldest Profession is a charming, low-stakes little jamboree.

The album's top heavy, and its finest moments come when T.I.'s able to look past himself, whether it be to attack the legal or education system. The rest is frustratingly mixed.

Much like their genre, Clock Opera's music is nothing new, but has charming roots.

Absolutely perfect, sun-soaked pop.

I Love You Dude is offensive in its banality, and other than that it's so mundane that it's tough to even want to care.

Raekwon returns with material to please both generations of his fans.

There's a great EP's worth of material hiding within Replicants, and I wish it had stayed that way.

Guaranteed both to amuse and to confuse, Ten$ion is a masterpiece of kitsch: an intently provocative, tongue-in-cheek rave-rap record, by a cryptic performance art group.

Lasers is more an indictment of the state of mainstream rap than anything. This is the absolute worst-case scenario of what can happen when commerce is placed above art, and in this instance it's especially offensive because Lupe is someone who doesn't need to bend over backward to be accessible.

The levels of electronics that come in and out subtly, but skilfully, on the album's best songs are an indication of how much time Jason Drake has put into them. It's just a shame that this shines light more intensely on the songs where he didn't.

The most disappointing aspect about Syd Tha Kid's delivery is her inability to create a remotely compelling protagonist - something Odd Future members have proved themselves more than capable of doing.

There are, sadly, very few moments on Set the Tone that don’t feel phoned in, awkward, or outright bored. Even the skits feel like a forced attempt to recapture a bit of Ghostface’s zaniness.

Who knows whether the notoriously megalomaniacal Jackson would approve of this album-people on both sides of that argument have valid points-but as a start-to-finish collection of songs it's more enjoyable and less filler-stuffed than anything he's released since Bad, a minor miracle given the circumstances.

[The songs'] punchiness and repetitiveness can quickly get on one's nerves, depending on your disposition.

Unfortunately it's largely downhill from here [after opener "Silence"].

It’s flashier, louder, a little more daring in places, yet also somehow more hollow and faceless.