Louche rumbles such as Death And Destruction echo the furious rockabilly assault of a Jim Jones, without the obligatory quiff or preacher schtick, but that doesn’t stop leader Adam Weiner sing smouldering piano ballads such as Forever and Montreal.

They’ve stripped away the guitars to the point where only trace elements remain. ... The whole thing makes Ed Sheeran sound like Extreme Noise Terror.

Accomplished but derivative.

These 45 songs on 3CDs comprise the best overview yet of NC&TBS’s unique and evocative voodoo.

Jones’s vocal has gutsed-up, gained a gravel-gargling Waits-ian weight that suits TRM’s swampland boogie perfectly. Elsewhere No Fool swaggers loutishly, Aldecide sows a Bad Seed vibe and Boil Yer Blood delivers on its promise. Righteous stuff and then some.

Every song is a standout.

Occult Architecture is pleasing enough, if a little deodorised at times.

If anything on Into The Woods Brock and his merry men (including drummer Richard Chadwick and keyboardist Tim Blake) conjure, not the mellowness but the magic and mystery, even malevolence, of nature.

The resulting sound is mature and measured, with similarities to Dulli’s work with the Twilight Singers more easily applicable than anything in Whigs essentials Congregation or Gentleman.

Confessional, witty, with a touch of The Vaselines, Swear I’m Good At This finds singer Alex Luciano magnifying small daily failures and turning them into works of art.

While Wayne, Lucid Nightmare and the 50s mirrorball romance of Crystal Night maintain the crisp retro spark of old, the rest of this somewhat inspired 55-minute mess smacks of the Fat Whites’ sticky-trousered narco-country.

Moore, along with My Bloody Valentine’s Deb Goodge (bass) and guitarist James Sedwards (Chrome Hoof) and the aforementioned Shelley, is displaying a fine linear growth with Rock N Roll Consciousness.

The record oozes confidence and spunky attitude--a far cry from her more recent country records thanks to the partnership with past collaborators Jeff Trott and Tchad Blake.

Carlene Carter duets on five of the 13 songs, notably What Kind Of Man Am I (sung by Sheryl Crow in Ghost Brothers...) and the light-hearted Sugar Hill Mountain (from Ithaca), while elsewhere Mellencamp shines alone--particularly on Sad Clowns (where his voice and lyric hurtles into Tom Waits territory) and All Night Talk Radio.

They continue to show a maverick character of their own while sharing Parker’s ear for a heady, swirling prog-pop soundscape.

Two or three weaker numbers drag quality levels down, but Pollinator contains enough vintage Blondie spirit to get the old juices flowing again.

Lanegan is on daring and seductive form throughout. The Passenger-lite Emperor misfires but that’s forgivable with a strike rate this high.

At the heart of the album is Brooker’s dextrous keyboard work, his pristine piano-playing embellished in all the right places by Josh Phillips’s Hammond organ. What’s equally impressive is the might of Brooker’s voice, which has lost none of its vigour in the 50 years since he first skipped the light fandango.

Death Song (their first album in four years and one whose title neatly appends their name to the VU classic that first inspired them) is their heaviest to date, a toxic draught of garage-rock and booming psychedelia that buzzes with echo and reverb.

A must-hear for fans of glorious, horrible noise.

All the emo-rooted, posthardcore stylistic hallmarks are present and correct, embellished with a load of electronic arsing about on top, but the almost constant use of the same soaring ‘wo-ah’ pop hooks will soon have you wanting to hack your ears off with a pair of blunt scissors.

The news is good though: Davies is in terrific, matchless voice, his storied career standing up to a sprawling treatment without too much drag.

Where a fug of overdriven psychedelic effects could overwhelm the message and the music--particularly on the ritualistic Call Upon The Fire and the exquisitely trippy Absolution Song-- he instead maintains subtlety, style and superb songcraft in a slow movement that’s all his own.

The album is still as random as a Frenchman’s hat at times, though, and songs like Mad Shelley’s Letterbox and the superb 1970 In Aspic (‘Your bacteria are in me,’ intones Hitchcock, wide-legged and eyeless) couldn’t be written by anyone else. A worthwhile ball to put in his canon.

A few lesser tracks overplay the voyeuristic horror-movie violence, but otherwise Body Count are sounding much more like hardcore elder statesmen than a shock-rock side project.

Although micro-melody whimsy is at its heart, there’s a Tangs/Radiophonic Workshop slant that gives tracks such as Midwinter Rites a spooky Kill List/Children Of The Stones edge.

Such is Taylor’s bristling conviction, and the mastery of his sparse instrumentation, that he holds you transfixed.

Time may have dulled some of their digital dexterity but their enthusiasm is undimmed, as is their ear for what makes a good Fairport song.

While Mental Illness doesn’t stray too far from the beaten path, it does offer something new for seasoned Mann watchers.

There’s plenty more to like. The imaginary soundtrack piece Fact 67 is full of neat Sturm und twang; Dropping Bombs On The Sun is a pretty, hazy piece with a spooked Parks vocal that lives up to the title. If you like Ornette Coleman and all that jazz, then Don’t Get Lost is your friend.

There are passages of experimentation around this album’s edges, such as the post-nuclear drones of Roots Remain, and electronic effects that suggest prolonged exposure to mid-period Tangerine Dream. But Mastodon never really develop these intriguing tendencies.

This moving yet strangely exhilarating album is a distant relative of The Residents’ 1979 album Eskimo, their sonic studies of Arctic culture.

Six inessential demos added to the original album hardly warrant the ‘deluxe edition’ tag. But as a document of a musical sea change, Ultramega OK is indispensable.

Their punk training doesn’t quite lend them that particular grace. As a result, this can feel like a bit of a rough ride in places, albeit an intriguing one.

Scratch the surface and nothing really shines. This nod to the past feels more like regression than a return to former glories.

Jawbone is not only accomplished, it’s also occasionally stunning.

There’s gold to be uncovered here.

Harder, heavier and more cohesive than their Manifest Decimation debut, Nightmare Logic is precise and snappy enough to win over hardcore fans too.

Only diluted by a couple of thin tracks, Spirit is an impressively robust late-career album. Emotionally naked yet clad in thick, metallic armour, Depeche Mode are growing old angrily, and it suits them.

Wild Cat does get samey with 11 songs, but it’s a whole lotta fun and fans will lap it up.

Ultimately, every track on this masterfully sculpted set courses with life-affirming pop-rock passion.

Almost every song plods along for six minutes or more. It’s punishing. The beauty of middleaged Overkill is that they weren’t middle-aged Metallica. Sigh.

Bush are far from the abomination of media repute, but Black And White Rainbows won’t convert the long-term haters, and seems too torpid to mobilise a fresh generation of fans.

Mayall’s never going to dislodge Beano, but it’s ridiculous for an 83-year old to sound this relevant.

Feedback maestro Buck leads the layers of exultant guitar ideas, such as the T.Rex riffs deep in the mix of Shave The Cat, and they help Escovedo drink deep of his sources to climb back into the light.

New album Hard Love is altogether more bullish, Showalter unleashing his inner rock beast on a collection of songs that seem to reach for some kind of epiphany through sheer volume.

This album is as good as we could expect from the Mary Chain in 2017.

A little bit of growing up wouldn’t go amiss.

Genderbender is a born star, charisma dripping from every syllable, while The Melvins’ trademark heaviness complements and contrasts her bohemian, dramatic delivery like sea salt in caramel. This fairy wears boots and is ready to kick ass.

This is modern life sliced up with the precision of a medical scalpel and then force-fed through a high-density filter of piss and vinegar.

The Feelies’ grip of melody remains very much in place throughout, as do their love of jangling intertwining guitars and a strict sense of rhythm.

Sleeping Through The War apparently has some kind of political undercurrent, but its (thankfully) obfuscated by Charlie Michael Parks Jr’s unhurried drawl and the layers of fuzzy atmospherics that, hopefully, point to the shape of stoner rock to come.

Sick Scenes is among LC!’s most accomplished collection yet.

Strings stutter and fall, the tone can best be described as lush, gentle and reassuring.

Still favouring extended excursions (see White Rose), their acquaintance with melody is developing into first-name terms to create a fabulously hypnotic trip.

A couple of lesser tracks bloat into shapeless abstraction, but overall this is a sonically lavish and formally bold reinvention.

As it is, there’s a certain Wagnerian tweeness about the record, its changes predictable, it’s progressions too easily resolved, his tunings over-familiar. The whole thing feels like drinking several pints of spring water.

Big Bad Beautiful Noise is their first album in four or so years, and it’s their best and most consistent since 1988’s seminal Birth School Work Death.

The Anglophile lingo (‘He’s such a dear boy’), opiated nursery drawl and woozy organ of Charlie’s Lips is deep in homage to Barrett’s Floyd, just as the Hammond in You Never Learn is to Al Kooper on ’65 Dylan duty. More interesting is the tendency to trancey, transformative repetition on the likes of the autobiographical, sick-bed sweaty Little Stars.

Several navel-gazing songs about musicianship only cement Eitzel’s reputation as a songwriter’s songwriter, favouring tinkering with classic structures over tugging the low-hanging heartstrings or banging out honking great hooks, but this ferryman will definitely get fans of arch-folk to the other side.

Essentially, Chapman is an old-style saloon storyteller whose reflections are enhanced and coloured by his myriad guitar treatments, an old dog not afraid of new tricks.

There’s a joyous spontaneity behind the obvious discipline. What makes this such a damn fine record is that the band never allow themselves to get bogged down in minutiae; it’s the big picture which counts.

The punk energy remains, frontman Davy Havok’s vocal delivery dripping with drama and passion, but with a glorious, gilded production job from guitarist Jade Puget, AFI (The Blood Album) luxuriates in a velvety richness that makes it a sumptuous listen.

Stripped of the sonic chaos of Mastodon and ATD-I, the rhythm section are free to just let go and pummel, proving a perfect foil for Sanders’ caveman roar. Meanwhile, the frequent quieter, more considered moments, such as the creeping, ghostly Dublin, have an underlying sense of spaced-out dread.

The band venture away from their own back yard for the first time, recording this new album in El Paso. It results in a pleasingly broader palette, from the redneck power pop of Sandlot, to the melodic and bouncy Madness-like closer We’ll Meet Again.

This time around, the woozy, comforting psychedelia of old remains, the songs trickling into one another, sleepy synths sighing, purring and pulsating. But Eternally Even comes with the biggest serving of soul he’s cooked up yet, sexy basslines sizzling even as he looks death in the face for We Ain’t Getting Any Younger Parts 1 and 2.

The result is the band’s most concise effort since Strung Out In Heaven.

There’s a theme, numbered from 14; dramatic, cinematic, dark but (disappointingly) modern-dancey. 18 hits an ambient spot, though, and 20 is the big ole cosmic epic we really crave.

In a nutshell: fuzzily fierce.

The album pushes an inspired blues-hued blend of their irreverent moonshine gospel romps--‘Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition’ sings Love on Exodus (Movement Of War People)--comedown confessionals (Nothing To Lose But Your Chains) and gutbucket reflection (Rattlesnake Woman), all crucially spiked with the blackest humour.

Recorded just weeks after Barre’s arrival, the album shows Tull still clinging to a blues root although reaching for something entirely new.

24-track double album of brittle, emotive folk pop and alt.rock.

All in all, this is a reissue as reissues ought to be done. A brilliant and familiar album remastered to perfection and bolstered by plenty of legitimately unheard material. Heavenly indeed.

It’s a package that’s pretty hard to improve on but this anniversary edition tries its damnedest to turn things up to eleven.

An excellent remaster accentuates the nuances and stresses the space in a mix that’s by turns claustrophobic and widescreen, crisps hi-hats, sharpens ice-pick guitar shards and further fattens bass subsonics. There are extra tracks, B-sides, Peel sessions, a live ‘rehearsal’ set from Manchester’s Factory, and it’s only a joy.

The Early Years feels like a huge, essential slice of rock history, showing a band with the world at their feet who could, and did, go anywhere they pleased.

While it may not be the most musically involved album of his 50-year career, it’s persuasive evidence that Young still has a lot to offer.

This alt.bluegrass band remain in a field of their own, dragging old-times instrumentation into fresh relevance.

Throw in the odd ambient curveball and you’ve got an album fizzing with life from experts in their field.

There’s nothing novel or exciting here, but at least they seem to be having a ball.

If the joyous Ready For The Magic isn’t already an indie club floor filler, it damn well should be.

Whereas the DVD offers a longer set, including jewels in her crown like Broken English, the CD selects just 45 minutes, highlighting more recent material and covers, before sauntering into a forlorn As Tears Go By, a resilient Sister Morphine and a finale of The Ballad Of Lucy Jordan.

Blue & Lonesome captures the Rolling Stones--The Greatest Urban Blues Band In The World--in their element, doing what they do best. You’ll only wish they did it more.

Ship Of Fools is a gloriously and unapologetically joyous listen, and one that serves to remind us how the Flaming Lips lost their mojo, while simultaneously showing Empire Of The Sun the way forward.

From the woozy menace of No Air and the Killing Joke-tinged Shadows through to the doomy rampage of Living In Lye, this rocks harder and smarter.

The skeletal arrangements allow the controlled frailty of Doherty’s voice to pack a stronger emotional punch.

Avenged Sevenfold have lost any previous limitations and inhibitions, and they’ve crafted a landmark metal album.

Lazarus--partly because it’s a show with a great band, partly because many of David Bowie’s songs are peculiarly adaptable to the musical format--works as a record.

It’s obvious that under the production guidance of Andy Sneap, the band have been pushed on every level. The result is one of the best metal albums of 2016--one that proves Testament can match anyone.

Divorced from the visual spectacle--puppets, illusionists, avian transformations, ticker-tape poetry--and the thrill of watching actual Kate Bush actually singing, this audio recording is akin to John Lennon being resurrected to perform the Wedding Album--i.e. only mildly amazing.

All flutes and bubbles, A Jammed Exit could be a Jethro Tull B-side, and only dedicated lovers of the eight-minute free-form scree solo need apply to Nervous Tech (Nah John), which is essentially Frank Zappa having a fit. Run for the exits.

Shiny Happy People still feels like an irritant, while the Turtles-y Near Wild Heaven is pleasant at best. By contrast, the muted baroque of Low and the anguished beauty that seeps from the heart of Country Feedback--so intense in the live arena that Michael Stipe often sang it on his knees, with his back to the audience--are classic examples of the band at their moody, mysterious best.

It may not quite give you the sheer electric shock jolt of their classic Meantime and Betty albums, but Helmet are still capable of bloodying your nose from 100 paces.

Everyone has done their bit to honour the music and the man. The result is a record that hums with excitement and does Miller proud.

Motorik psychedelia at its finest, The Lucid Dream have stepped up.

Acoustic is a consistent collection that works best when the songs are strongest, and it’s movingly effective on the final track, a cover of Richard Hawley’s Long Black Train.

A bumpy ride overall, but with enough peaks to excuse the more pedestrian sections.

This House Is Not For Sale is no masterpiece, and while the punchy title track sonically nods to their heyday, most of it is made up of by-numbers pop.