Although the album is an exercise in euphoric clubland dreaming, tracks Closer and Everything Is Beautiful remind us there is perhaps a more sincere side to Kylie that is often overlooked.

While Hamburg Demonstrations doesn’t have Doherty retiring his military guards jacket, there’s definitely a greater helping of wholesome maturity to be found in this patchworked and homey collection of ballads both old and new.

They have plenty to make them stand out from the crowd. The legacy of Seattle grunge is alive and well and being extended in the hands of Strange Wilds.

Brief though it is, 'Strange Weather, Isn't It?' represents a remarkable sharpening of focus at a time of flux - and possibly crisis - for the band.

It's alright and will shift units: boundaries will rest easy however.

Move Through The Dawn is an album sadly bereft of impact, from its lacklustre cover onwards.

A record that stretches the boundaries, ‘UTOPIA’ feels like his finest hour.

Some may find something deep and spiritual amongst the cuts on Outside, but it just makes this reviewer want to stay indoors.

Sweet, intimate and tender, Trick is a tempting treat.

While at times lacking in lyrical insight, Fink’s ability to maintain an atmosphere, to build up gentle, soothing bubbles of sound, is largely unmatched.

Accomplished again, then, and greatly engrossing throughout. It’s just lacking that crucial aspect of singular appeal to stand aside from a fiercely competitive pack.

Kintsugi hits hard due to its lightness, its bitter heart shrouded in soft arpeggios and catchy riffs.

Cosmic Wind still manages to set a mood, languorous and lush, perfect on a capital’s rooftop, cocktail in hand, the last sunrays hitting perfectly. But you can all too easily imagine this slotting into some Spotify algorithm, a mood playlist titled “Summer Vibezz”.

Still splitting opinion. Still weaving rich pop tapestries from whatever fibres take their fancy. They deserved better.

The band's melancholic core remains intact on a record that's best listened to through headphones in a big coat while crying. What is noticeable in its absence is any foray into flat out, ear-grating noise á la 'Doe Deer' or 'Alice Practice'.

These tracks are both club and headphone worthy, insular and expansive, ephemeral and dense, lush and skeletal; their only uniting factor, Thom's voice, curling like a wraith through their intricate insistent landscapes. Captivating.

This debut album from the Manchester trio is a captivating Gothic Americana creation.

The London quintet have raised their game, with something a whole lot more classy, salvaging them from the landfill indie chute.

Brilliant album; an album that will become – in time – as significant and important to Gahan’s career as Johnny Cash’s ‘American’ series was to his enduring legacy.

They could do with a couple more uptempo nuggets like 'The Kids Were Wrong'.

YACHT have consciously positioned themselves as intelligent conceptualists, not wanting to adhere to what's expected of them, and that makes for an interesting amalgam of deep themes set to brazenly outlandish pop styles.

While the sheer breadth of Wait ‘Til Night can’t fail to impress, the album lacks certain cohesiveness. That said, there’s an honest creativity here that ripples through proceedings.

It still stands tonally a much stronger package than his last two releases and is filled with far more highs than lows.

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.

While the album is undeniably well produced and generally well performed, unfortunately Woods' fails in his first attempt to stand out from the crowd.

When we’re not soaring we’re wrapped in ambient solemnity, all the while fixated on Nika Danilova’s voice: theatrical, confessional and, perhaps for the first time, totally unafraid.

It may not be quite up there with fan favourites ‘Fever’ and ‘Light Years’, but proves a lot more memorable than ‘Body Language’ or her previous studio set, 2010’s ‘Aphrodite’, were.

This second studio effort from FINNEAS is less experimental than the 2021 debut ‘Optimist’, but has more of a direction, even if said direction becomes a little formulaic toward the latter half of the record.

Despite these few fleeting moments of greatness, Everything Now feels like the band's first missfire record of their career, with its lack of a focused concept, cohesiveness and heart.

Instrumentally, the generous helpings of tenor sax, soft electric piano and clarinets give Fatherland a depth that warrants further listens once Kele’s rounded melodies and acoustic guitar structures have been dissected.

This may not be their defining album, but you get the sense that in moving away from their punkier roots, La Sera’s best work may be just around the corner.

A time-bridging release that stands as an essential and timely reminder of just how rock ‘n’ roll ought to be played.

Wyldest writes lyrics that are sparse, but that is not to say that they don’t have bite.

A noble experiment, ‘Digital Roses Don’t Die’ displays an artist willing to stretch, willing to take risks. He never names the source of his adoration, but the real winners here are Big K.R.I.T.’s fans.

A rallying cry for alt-pop insurgency, at its over-sharing best ‘WEIRD!’ firmly places YUNGBLUD as a dazzling Catherine wheel of Top 40 deviancy.

You’re left wondering what impact ‘AUSTIN’ will have on his fans, and on Post Malone’s future work. Is this a one-off deviation, a resetting of the dials? Or will these acoustic templates become his bedrock? Whatever the future holds, this is an album that dares to buck trends, and at its best can be genuinely moving.

Kept to a trim 35 minutes, there’s actually surfeit of highlights on display – each track lands, while owning an incredible sense of breadth.

Despite being less hit-filled than previous works, ‘Piss In The Wind’ is potentially the most authentic Joji project to date, a scenic route through every facet of his sonic and auditory identity.

There’s a playful sense of bawdy humour at work across White Women. Some may find the irony unpalatable, but there’s little denying Chromeo’s cheeky pop mastery.

The result is a joyous and soulful collection of summery pop songs and urgent sun-drenched ditties that grow with you over time.

World Of Joy, ultimately, is impounded by its own musical influences.

Good, but for completists.

Joy is like a rickety wooden rollercoaster--there are a few nice inclines with some mildly disappointing drops between some pulsating flats, and you end up getting off slightly begrudgingly.

‘Rockmaker’ is an experience of the addictive kind, a fitting reminder of what’s terrific about the Portland band, and it offers something novel, something blistering.

This sophomore release is a brave and stunning progression that now solidifies the statement that this group can grow past 2011 without going stale.

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.

Pitched as the genealogy of DFA records in one album, Shit Robot finally lays down his manifesto as an incisive filter.

Everything about this album is bigger than what has gone before and reveals an energised band with a real belief in what they're doing. Quite right too.

With 17 tracks this album could be expected to take off to somewhere fantastic but, although we stay very much on the same page throughout the duration of the record, the pristine production of A Moment Of Madness is faultless.

There are no bounds. ‘Exotico’ let’s go of control, so remarkable things can happen. It’s the closest Temples have been to releasing a masterpiece, and that’s saying something.

Album stand-outs ‘Heavy, California’ and ‘Happy Man’ would have slotted into the last LP seamlessly and, considered as a whole, For Ever feels like an opportunity missed.

This Party succeeds in merely rejuvenating, rather than reinventing, wonderful Wanda.

It’s a declaration that cocktail hour is officially over, having also ditched any collaborations for this knotted beat scene bow, while still able to rise up in glory like sun pouring through a stained glass window (‘Tiptoes’) and sport the luminosity of a screwball gent just when you think the batteries are fading.

It’s not a bad record by any stretch, albeit one where the turgid does bump ugly against the terrific.

No Tourists is unlikely to win The Prodigy any new fans but it’s unlikely to upset any existing ones. And really, if rave-influenced industrial dance is your thing, these old heads are still a cut above anyone else out there.

It’s a beautifully sunny, unashamedly melodic tour de force which pitches up somewhere between a fevered Beatles obsession and a well-loved pile of Go-Betweens records.

Repent Replenish Repeat is their most mixed work to date.

PersonA sees a band stretching their creative wings and expanding their sound far beyond the fireside jammage that created them and becoming a more respectable prospect for it. The sun worshippers have added dashes of shadow and are all the more interesting for it.

Breakin’ Point is a technicolour blur worth your time.

Quirky but accessible, ebullient but tragic, it's their most accomplished record yet.

Eurgh! is, dare we say, unashamedly millennial, and implicit in its pissed-off puerility. This is why it triumphs, because there’s no room for subtlety in times like these.

It captures the trials of his journey so far whilst celebrating his current success and the gross potential to do even more. The collaborations are authentic and humble, apt for the LP’s subtly intimate nature. Lil Baby has set the tone for his next phase.

On Shangri La he has captured everything cleanly and sparsely to really let Jake’s storytelling shine. The resulting exposure makes for a mature and remarkable album.

The brilliance of The Getaway is in its subtleties, which define their most intimate and expressive album to date, and suggest that, after 32 years, the Chilis can still keep us guessing.

The album is a promising sweet-treat.

Bottling up teenage emotions and expressing it in effervescent electronica and wistful melodies, their self-titled debut is 16 tracks of minimalistic and clean compositions overridden with Paul Klein’s lovestruck lyrics.

It's so steeped in New York's musical cliche of disco and glammed-up dance that it struggles to take flight under its own power.

The songs are simple sing-alongs with some lovely hooks--but trying to open his sound to random ideas and new styles just doesn’t seem to suit.

It’s a touching journey reflecting on how the four boys changed into men and changed the world through the power of music at the same time.

The resulting album, on which she’s joined (as ever) by the brilliant Bobb Bruno, is an irresistibly upbeat tribute to self-care, reflection, and the joy of the everyday.

‘Sea Change’ is as epic as anything that came later, Knights’ vocal supplemented by a rich seam of orchestration, but much of the material here could have been lifted from those early recordings, where skeletal fret work frames angelic vocals. A return to the source.

Bar a couple of underwhelming or wholly unoriginal takes, 'The Metallica Blacklist' is a surprisingly solid listen considering its breadth. While the snobbier rock connoisseur out there might still view Metallica’s king-making album as when they ‘sold-out,’ this set just shows how malleable, how influential, and just how damn fun these songs still are.

This is God Damn growing into themselves, their sound and with a UK tour in full swing running into October; it’s only going to get better from here onwards.

The real issue with the album though, more than any other, is its length (and the inconsistency that this brings with it). Few albums ever benefit from being 17 tracks long, particularly when there are obvious candidates for exclusion. And without wanting to sound too dismissive of the aforementioned chart ambitions, it’s here that sacrifices could have been made for the benefit of a more coherent and engaging record.

Whilst her lyrical ability is still under question, there’s no doubting her ability to arrange a band and alter the mood and meanings of some undying classics.

While seemingly a far cry from much of Cole’s early work. It’s clear that despite the pervading neo-classical influence of the record, what it does share with the rest of his canon is a clear, deft understanding of music that can’t be argued against. At a time when much of the world is forced to stay indoors, 'Madrugada' provides a breath of fresh air.

An attempt to sidestep presumptions and carve out new space, ‘Transparency’ could be the most unexpected move of Twin Atlantic’s career.

Fusing fragility with fierceness, ‘Polari’ is a confident debut offering from Olly and is an expressive and euphoric collection of floor-filling, punchy tracks that oozes confidence, colour and charm.

Largely though, this is the sound of Casablancas giving a middle-fingered salute to his past.

Funk’s career-defining skill for making worlds collide, in the heart, the head, and the studio, continues majestically.

While A Moment Apart has the foundations of a great album, ODESZA fall slightly short of the mark.

The freshness comes through in the delivery, which is as loose as electronic music permits, delivered with the bluesy rawness that frontman Dave Gahan wanted from the album.

While end-of relationship heartache churns throughout You & I, there is enough twisted darkness to suggest these sisters are here for the long haul.

Johnny Foreigner are, thankfully, still showing no desire to slow down.

‘Alpha Games’ is an exciting return with addictive hooks and array of infectious album stand outs.

Even with its compact 10 tracks, however, not everything here connects. ‘Think U The Shit (Fart)’ is juvenile in a manner she feels beneath her; the way ‘Gimmie A Light’ crunches that Sean Paul sample feels a little naff – at least until the production cranks it up a notch. There’s enough here, however, to display why so much attention is place on her name.

Chaosmosis from its title onwards is endearingly flawed, but the sense of communal enjoyment with which they are synonymous radiates from a large swathe of this material and it remains pretty addictive.

It's identikit jangle so packed with perfectly poised personality that I find it hard to take it even vaguely seriously.

The mask of the brooding troubadour doesn’t quite fit: the LP is marred by below-par, uninspired vocals and rudimentary lyrics.

It ultimately falls between two stools - not giving a true portrayal of a Villagers live show, and failing to mix-up tracks enough to justify this ‘re-imagining’ of older material.

It’s not an album made for background listening, it’s made for losing yourself in completely, and, in that, it succeeds perfectly.

While it features some surging highs, it doesn’t quite dispel notions that Anne-Marie has yet to nail down a singular sound she can call her own.

Amid the deferential nods, Mazes exude vigour and vibrancy.

‘Under My Influence’ is a bold undertaking, but, at times, it feels unfinished. While many singles and supplementary songs showcase the band’s talent, much of the record weighs in as forgettable filler sounds that take some time in getting accustomed to.

Kevin Abstract’s newest studio album continues to assert him as one of the greatest talents of this generation, an individual who eliminates conformity and remains earnest and candid, regardless of the sonic environment he visits.

‘Broke Me In Two’, which you can already find online, is a good place to start if you’re looking for a sampler. Overall though, it’s a case of ‘good to have you back Joan’, and ‘next time, let’s have a bit more you and little less Lazar Davis’.

Compared to the previous self-titled record the features here are in sharp contrast, with less of a hip-hop emphasis. That doesn't mean they're not interesting, though.

Exhaustive and exhausting, ‘Rush!’ feels like the definitive word in this unlikely rock phenomenon – at its best, it’s a feral reminder of how entertaining the genre can be.