As is often the case with such acts, the anarchic energy doesn’t quite translate to their debut, ‘Hot Shock’, but it nevertheless serves as a largely enjoyable opening statement. The most interesting moments arrive at the back end of the record.

Things move from melodic ambience to galloping sci-fi workouts and back again, the highlight being the sublime 'Emerald And Stone'.

A great feel-good record for the summer months, this one is the perfect soundtrack for the car, park or beach. Just enjoy it.

‘I Don’t Live Here Anymore’ sees no severe changes from the Grammy award-winning 'A Deeper Understanding,' but does make for a more nimble listen, the track's shorter running time creating a tauter experience.

If you love Kasabian you might think Velociraptor! is a 9/10 album, but for the rest of us it's a salt-seasoned, Spielberg-sponsored 7/10.

She exudes the beauty of an artist comfortable in the idea of taking risks, an asset she’d do well to keep hold of as, from what exists on this record, you feel that a classic is just around the corner.

Drone Logic has peaks that dwarf its troughs, though, making Avery’s brave debut worth buying for its four best tracks alone.

Even after several listens there's little here to really strike a chord with the long-standing Foos fan. That's not to say it's poor - it's far from that.

You can see how some might dismiss ‘Dream Get Together’ as irrelevant noodling (oh yes, there are solos herein), but if you are unphased by such concepts then you will enjoy this album a lot.

Will Young is in fine form and, on this evidence, about 70% great.

Wayne Coyne’s lyrics occasionally aim to capture some of the small-town desperation of a Bruce Springsteen or John Mellencamp, referencing go-nowhere greasers and bikers with names like Johnny and Tommy. More often than not, however, he reverts to his usual themes: spaceships, magic forests and the undimmed majesty of the milky way.

This is an album that strips Rae Sremmurd down to their bare essence. Removing any excess, it allows their contradictions to come to the fore, with sometimes fascinating yet always gripping results.

Devoted followers of Miles Kane and fans of indie music will undoubtedly revel in this fifth offering, undoubtedly finding exhilaration through its live interpretations. But beyond that, it falls short of finding a remarkable status.

The Race For Space has its mis-steps, but most importantly it shows that Public Service Broadcasting aren't a one-off novelty act, and that there's mileage in their approach.

If anything, the album is held back by his ambition--imprudent testing falls short of his usual standards. There are lessons to be learned here, and as a document of Tyler's growth, this may well be looked back upon as a watershed moment.

Although uncompromising in it’s vision and delivery, Stranger To Stranger ultimately, serves as another fine testament to Simon’s craft and ingenuity as a songwriter.

This album is going to seriously divide opinions across the spectrum, from the trvest of metal sugariest of pop stans. But Poppy remains a daring and divisive artist making daring and divisive art, and ‘I Disagree’ is the perfect shot of adrenaline to kick start a new decade with.

It’s difficult to see ‘Michigan Boy Boat’ winning over the doubts – sure, it’s definite progression, but it feels more like a reinforcement of core values than an attempt to reach out.

The three-year hiatus has been worth the largely triumphant return.

The lyrical framework in which he operates is fairly supple and improvisatory, though there are some surprisingly tender lines here and there. Structures and voicings are stripped back but viscid synths and odd, glitchy effects whir in the background.

Strong and raw instrumentation lays a varied and strong foundation for a subdued vocal performance that charms listeners into a relaxed state, in which you can float along to the soaring instrumentals provided throughout.

Despite being heavily influenced by the 80’s, Lost Girls has a timeless feel and is sonically pleasing.

While Innocence Reaches won’t go down as their best, it’s refreshing to see that Kevin Barnes and Co. are continuing to reinvent themselves with some of their most anthemic, accessible, and socially pertinent singles to date.

The Curved Line is a robust collection that finds McKeown going from strength to strength.

Not quite as developed or controlled as its parent album, ‘Vapor City Archives’ underlines the sheer creative nous running through Machinedrum right now.

A sprightly ten-song set which could easily stand up to anything released in the ‘80s.

Overblown yet elegant and intimate, this is a bold undertaking; arcane, abstract, absolutely remarkable.

There's nothing completely new here, but fans are sure to be satisfied, at the very least, until the collective's next album arrives.

For all their recent productivity and renaissance, A Certain Ratio are no closer to their zeitgeist moment. But with output as strong as this sitting alongside their back catalogue, they are all the stronger for it.

A great album and a fascinating document undoubtedly, but there’s no need to spend your hard earned on a boxset when the original does everything you need already.

There's clearly a lot of promise here, but drenching everything in reverb and letting blast on the arpeggios doesn't equal a fully realised record. The band's musicianship is certainly accomplished, but the listener occasionally needs a reprieve from its sheer wall of jangle.

Scorpion might not be Drake’s most innovative work, but it does help to cement 40’s status as one of the best, and most consistent, producers of our generation, and sees Drake breaking ground commercially if not creatively.

At just ten tracks, it’s an easy listen. Of course, some of them have more repeat playability than others, but there are none that feel like filler.

A perfectly balanced album that matches her newfound vibe as a woman ready to tell her truth. This album is a note that good things come to those who wait.

At this stage Warpaint still have their boots in two camps: the icy cool of their indie heritage and the open-hearted joy of the kind of music they clearly want to make. As the album progresses the vibrancy that decorates its first half starts to brown.

Maybe the product of a transitional period in Rowsell’s life, it’s easy to get lost yourself in the singer’s endearing lyricism.

There’s little here to alienate his fanbase: these 10 tracks might sprawl in length but they’ve a familiar mesh of earnest words and slow builds, autumnal in hue but with a fireside warmth.

An ostentatiously operatic tour de force.

ye is by no means Kanye West’s finest moment, but it’s a reminder not to count him out just yet.

All in all, this is a good album. While it has some magnificent moments, it doesn't quite come together enough to make a for a completely stellar ride.

The closest ‘Quadra’ comes to breaking new ground and entering unclaimed territory is the dramatic metamorphosis of Green’s voice during the nostalgic nu-metal hymn ‘Agony of Defeat’, not to mention the superb acoustic intro and the profane chorus of ‘Guardians of Earth’. More crucially, the samba drum-kit of ‘Capital Enslavement’ and the syncopated beat on ‘Raging Void’ shows that the idea of exploring percussive possibilities is slowly growing on them.

Subtitled ‘An Electro Revival’, Richard’s sixth album is nonetheless a sprawling affair; R&B, house and trap jostle alongside curios such as ‘Le Petit Morte (a lude)’ [sic], a break-up jam unexpectedly belted out over Beethoven’s ‘Moonlight Sonata’.

With its Krautrock-tinged rhythm, backwards guitar and soaring chorus, it suggests that this rested and revitalised incarnation of The Coral still has plenty to offer. Having grown tired, their enthusiasm is audibly restored.

Swanlights is less straightforward than his other records and more operatic. It's still astonishingly beautiful.

A comforting, cathartic playground for disco, funk and cross-genre collabs, Sophie Ellis-Bextor comes into her own on ‘Perimenopop’.

It’s a record that at first curiously struggles to find its footing, before an assured mid-section guides Cardi B to the next level of her career.

This is West’s most polarizing record to date, yet the discussion surrounding it gives a healthy charge to a rap game saturated with the same ol’ same ol’. So no, Yeezus isn’t a great record, but it doesn’t have to be.

The withdrawals into ambient cusps test something of a pleasure-pain theory, and to Shed's credit the bombshells rarely follow the same pattern - a four-by-four here, a hop and skip there, seeing him scooping up arenas with a tremendously powerful iron fist.

The result is something that sounds mechanical and generally detached from emotion.

This release feels infused with self-assurance and pride, merging know-how and passion with a strong vision that only seems to get bolder with each release.

While never quite holding together as a set, NIN continues to admirably cover new ground while doing what they do best, namely reflecting humanity’s worst impulses.

Where Bodega do succeed is in serving up an entertaining, intellectual and heartfelt riposte to the broken systems that have engulfed our culture, albeit in a slightly less successful fashion than before.

At times the production is marred by brevity and unevenness, which can make ‘BUBBA’ sound more like a mixtape in places. Thankfully, these moments are outnumbered by others where Kaytranada is well and truly back on form.

Daniel Avery’s DJ-Kicks does nothing ground breaking and for a listener familiar with his productions and sets, will excite only for the new material it contains.

The tracks ebb and flow, never stopping in a static moment but chasing a thought, an ideal and holding out hope.

Largely Uyai stands as a genre meshing oddity which, thanks to its pure groove and spirituality, will appeal to those who haunt the dance floor as well as their own dimly lit bedrooms.

This is a punchy record sure to spark some vital debates, as well as having a solid slew of crowd-pleasers.

‘Caos’ is an arresting, if imperfect, scream from the heart.

But for all its merits, much of the chaos on MASSEDUCTION tends to move rapidly in one ear and out the other, making it a pleasant but somewhat faceless affair.

Last Place is an occasionally misty-eyed but very welcome return. A broken but pretty mess.

Ultimately, the album’s highlights are those songs where the voice and sentiment we hear is truly her own, the enthralling, stirring, emotion- manipulating voice that’s threaded its way through every album since her 2006 debut, not the voice that leans too close to what the pop music machine demands.

Highlights ‘Voice’ and ‘Sonic 8’ will be a surefire test for any club or festival sound system to really prove its worth, and the cold, menacing techno of ‘Release’ sounds a bit like the insides of a power station working really hard to keep a city warm. That said, if you don’t have the huge rig needed to do these tunes justice, and with the days outside just getting warmer, it might be a tough sell to sit at home and curl up with ‘LP. 8’.

In choosing to move down a more percussive path, the Phoenix Foundation set themselves a challenge quite different than those they had previously faced. 80-minute double albums are usually tough to follow, but they've chosen to reconnect with the spirit of the band rather than try to top 'Fandango' in a self-conscious manner, and in doing so have redefined themselves.

The lyrics can spill into the realm of over-earnestness at points, but overall this is slick and dancefloor-ready.

Sure, it’s certainly not his best long-player, but the highlights stacked here--the truly awesome ‘The Introduction’, established heaters like ‘Fuck The Police’ (sequenced perfectly here towards the climax)--ensure The Diary is, in the end, a solid addition to the J Dilla catalogue.

As a whole, ‘Sogolo’ stands as a less cohesive package than 2023’s ‘Zango’, but it’s a braver, more energetic, and forward-thinking LP.

‘Stay Alive’ has a sense of quiet intensity running across its 13 tracks, material that uses points of inspiration gathered across the previous two year international tour. There’s a real vitality to the work, from the bare bones recording style so evocative of Albini’s work through to Laura’s powerful, trenchant vocals, erupting out of the speakers.

Brill Bruisers should finally see the band obtain the commercial success to match the critical acclaim they’ve accrued over the course of their last five LPs, as this is an almost perfect soundtrack to what’s left of the summer.

Her first studio affair in four years, ’11 Past The Hour’ finds Imelda May consolidating her distinctive position within pop’s pantheon.

The Hundred In Hands manage to create mesmeric tracks of monolithic noise and danceable beat.

The tricky second album phase has been completed and it’s an excellent product. The future’s bright.

A nice refresher, if a little unnecessary.

Far from an ill-advised sideways movement for its maker, from production to rhymes, Rap Album One finds a well-deserved home within Stones Throw’s prestigious catalogue.

Not every track is as strong as ‘Black Skin Girls’. ‘The Lion King: The Gift’ showcases what Beyoncé can do at her best and most creative, yet consistency is an issue with this eclectic album.

‘Between You and Me’ sounds as if it was both carefully constructed over a thousand hours, and improvised in one take, and it’s the most Flyte Flyte have ever sounded. Half of the album is simpler, softer, and more stripped-down sonically, and it showcases the vivid songwriting that Flyte are so expert at.

Taking their time means the album has a thoughtfulness and maturity about it that is often missing from debuts.

Myriad magical traditions and exemplary musicianship are boiled up in a big vat, like a transcendental potion.

The bared teeth and balls that made PABH so loveable in the first place are still splattered all over Blood, but for the first time it sounds like they have a plan.

They've mastered the anthemic choruses; all they need to work on now is the consistency.

Occasionally Rae slips into serviceable, insipid pop, but it’s a minor grievance in a record that takes her from monochromatic to technicolour dreaming.

No real surprises spring out, but tracks like ‘Dye The Water Green’ and ‘You’ demonstrate an impeccable creative beauty that his juniors will struggle to match.

This is still an intrinsically Maxwell record, but he navigates familiar tropes through friction and distressed noir-soul, the cohesiveness of the record all the more commendable as a result.

With features from Blxst, Yungeen Ace, Future, and Wale – amongst others – ‘Richer Than I Ever Been’ is shamelessly entertaining, the work of an artist who knows what his audience wants to hear.

Despite A New Nature’s ominous sound feeling hackneyed at times, EATW retain the fearless, forward-thinking ethic of their first two records through themes of finding strength in adversity, impassioned vocals and unpredictable sonic outbursts.

A trim 10 tracks – and 35 minutes of music – ‘Pink Cactus Café’ feels like a pared back record, a slightly old fashioned ‘two sides of vinyl’ structure.

Joanne is certainly not the all-conquering opus it was intended to be and will prove divisive, but it remains a daring and exciting record, delivered from one of modern pop’s most unique and singular voices.

This is the closest we’re likely to get to a new Sonic Youth album, and The Best Day is a great reminder of what made that band so special.

While this experimentation might falter in places, it is a necessary and important addition to the growing Teklife catalogue of releases, prompting future collaborations, discussion, and the honing of that coveted vibe.

At nine tracks, some short, Bananagun’s return is always enjoyable but never quite stellar. Bakel’s ability to conjure a thrilling live sound and tangible atmosphere deserves plaudits – let’s just hope that next time around, there’s a little more structure and a sound they can call 100% their own.

A dry and devilishly powerful psych rock collection, hard-nosed and sinister in all the right ways.

Unapologetically angsty and beautifully chaotic, Pale Waves have created a safe space for fans with ‘Unwanted’. A place of pride.

Polished production all around allows the band to really bring a twist to their previous music. Simple bass lines and drum beats are easily forgotten about, but the band use this to their advantage throughout the seven track production.

Within the iron grip, the looseness of categorisation between dubstep, grime, trap and mutant techno means each mission has something riding on it, transferring an aftershock of grim satisfaction throughout.

Ultimately, ‘They Got Amnesia’ succeeds in its ability to balance punchy, straight-up rap with a tinge of the bittersweet.

Rather than risk nestling ever-deeper into their cushy role as purveyors of twee-approved, candied indie-rock, The Radio Dept. have opted for a collection of songs that is as decidedly unapologetic as it is cemented in political sludge.

It's a damn fine record and manages to avoid treading exactly the same ground its older sister did.

‘Yayo’ and ‘Butterfly Paralyzed’ both showcase Lean’s ability to graft chrome-plated hooks onto any track he likes. The former is sparse and simple where the latter is full to the point of overload, but both tracks sound like evolved versions of songs you’d hear on the radio – music for a society of cyborgs.

‘OSMIUM’ isn’t a fun listen at times: it is filled with harrowing textures and tones, and sounds like a score to a very unpleasant film in places, but it is also enjoyable, in its own perverse way.