There's a delicious, deliberate irony to this atheist band putting their own 100mph spin on carols. [Jan 2014, p.115]

Big? Nope. Clever? Definitely. [Mar 2013, p.98]

The synth-heavy The Signal & The Noise shows they can still quest when the mood takes them, but overall the album plays to Simple Minds’ many strengths.

This baffling mixture of the anarchy and the ecstasy takes some pulling off but the quartet has perfected the alchemical reaction. [Nov 2014, p.96]

She still knows how to hone a catchy melody. [Summer 2014, p.88]

My Dying Bride remain steadfastly rooted in gloom. It's a nuanced gloom, though. [Apr 2020, p.87]

An exhilarating and unexpectedly uplifting record. [Sep 2024, p.71]

As a stand-alone album, it’s a trip. Where it fits in Dwyer’s canon is another kettle of bananas entirely.

Back To Land lets the sun in through the grooves. [Jan 2014, p.116]

An intricately crafted return to form. [Nov 2020, p.85]

While this album isn't quite as impressive as the record in its original guise, it's still an interesting shift in gears by the Mars Volta. [Jun 2023, p.77]

This is music to immerse yourself in, lose yourself within its many complexities and layers of sound, sudden explosions of light and directed commentary; always fascinating, challenging and densely packed. Sepulchral, sombre, challenging, claustrophobic. [Dec 2019, p.85]

Resolutely back in rich, seamy and downbeat alt.country territory. [Jun 2022, p.83]

Tracks like Drive, Novocaine and Black cloud sound like the soundtrack to a 1980s brat-pack comedy, nut the sheer vim and vigour with which they're delivered still make it a rock 'n' roll rush. [Jan 2014, p.116]

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.

The band's evident love for the material floods the performances, even though they can overdo the jamming when they get a groove going and reverence dampens Hooker's guest spot. But Petty's own songs, deployed sparingly, sound infinitely fresher and tighter. [Dec 2022, p.85]

Though the record’s real strength is the deft vocal interplay between Elsenburg and Jana Carpenter, who imbues things with a new sense of depth and, on Chasing Horses and the achingly lovely Tyrekickers, a nuanced sensitivity.

After initial queasiness at a moment of amorousness in Eraser (‘I’m just a toy waiting for you to play me’), it quickly becomes business as usual in terms of their shamelessly enormous pop-rock music.

The Menzingers deliver an energetic strain of melodic rock and bare their souls on aging, alcohol and angst. [Dec 2019, p.85]

Not quite a "new" album in the proper sense, but still a warming introduction to their world. [Dec 2018, p.89]

A set of songs that sound like someone's favourite record collection. [Feb 2020, p.89]

There's enough here that's new to renew your love of Hendrix. Yes, there's blood in the stone yet. [Apr 2013, p.94]

The presence of old Jam oppo Steve Brookes on slide guitar during a pop-art inspired In The Car, meanwhile, only adds to the sense of Weller returning to what he knows best. [Jun 2015, p.94]

It's a mad house of friction, attitude and ambition. [Oct 2025, p.77]

His [Brian Henneman's] Tom Petty-tinged voice and bursts of Rickenbacker guitar reinforce the familiar sound. Unfortunately he doesn’t always move with the times.

After 30 years behind the mic, Hersh's vocals have gained extra grit and lost none of their eerie magic. [Oct 2018, p.89]

Commune may seem a little pat, a compendium of psychedelic, exotic and ethnic sounds, but it makes for a handy compilation. [Oct 2014, p.89]

Classic don't need varnish. [Jul 2020, p.87]