All told, it's a rag-tag collection, and one that comes short of the band's high standards even allowing for the commercial backlash.

R.O.O.T.S. is so crushingly flat that it should waft between the cracks unnoticed.

Hooks hit their fleshy mark here and there--'Dead End' is a compulsive, '80s-flavoured high and 'High On The Heels'' clipped acid house proves endearingly gauche--but it's cold comfort on a record that fleshes out a promising template to only diminishing returns.

This album feels like it's tuning into everything, connecting with everything. Welcome to Maii. And welcome to the future.

Karin Dreijer Andersson would probably make for a fascinating interview but her reluctance to talk about her music is a blessing. There's simply no way she'll ever live up to these sounds.

It's an intelligent, beguiling and charming record, from a man who has often seemed to lack all but the first of these qualities, and the first thing he's done since The Libertines' debut to make you feel genuine hope for his future.

It would be unfair to dismiss the record completely, however, as there are definite highlights.

The feeling remains though that their broad emotional strokes will have to concede something to intimacy and solitude to ever really win hearts.

Beware is a 40-odd minute work that ebbs, flows and carries you along perfectly.

MSTRKRFT make a racket that's impressive at first but eventually the echoes of it return to bite them.

The record has some horrific moments, nearly all of them Borrell's.

All I Ever Wanted, which though always singable swings wildly from bruised to bubblegum, sounds like a team of hired hands writing hits to order. Still, the increased chorus count is welcome and will put a smile back on Clive Davis's face.

As is so often the case though all it takes is a fall to flush away fanciful tendencies and with All The Plans they revisit wholesale what it was that made them a draw in the first place (other than sounding a bit like Coldplay).

Unfortunately for the oh-so-cleverly named Mongrel are nothing more than a patronising exercise in telling the poor listener what they already know: that governments can be corrupt, war on the whole is not pleasant and we all have a right to freedom.

They seem afraid to risk a good old-fashioned jungle break-out, the likes of which would be genuinely invigorating.

For the lovers, this patchy album offering moderate advance on its immediate predecessors will probably suffice. But in truth it's an unmitigated failure to reconcile the sound of their past with a cohesive vision of their future.

Big by design, poignant yet relentlessly uplifting, it has the feel of a career crowning glory, or at the very least a second album, not a first attempt.

Detractors will point to a failure to effectively up their game with 200 Million Thousand but the sly sense of craft remains.

While its thoughtfulness prevents it from getting carried away with itself--he's not exactly doing the can-can here--there is a definite sense of optimism and personal brightness radiating from all four corners of this record. It will be a difficult one to top.

The question is whether Years Of Refusal finds Morrissey still opening his musical horizons and legs, or reverting to sour type. Predictably for a man whose solo career often seems to be a sadistic exercise in frustration, the answer lies between the two.

The feeling persists that The Century Of Self marks an important moment for ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead--one in which they began to weave together their diverging paths and one that, after all, should be hailed as a victory.

The Spirit Of Apollo, a record boasting some of the most pioneering musical talent of the last three decades, does not sound "timeless" but nor does it seem an appropriate tonic, voices passing unheralded in a confusion of mediocre, glossy production, guests from the stratosphere reduced to faces in the crowd.

Much of It's Not Me's bummed-out vibes seem rooted in sound artistic sense, but musically a sunken-eyed pallor has replaced the rosy-cheeked flush and, you know what, it all gets a bit...draggy.

As a collection of songs it tentatively experiments with genres and musical devices so as to appear less of the poor man's B-sides of its predecessor; but at the same time daren't stray too far from the blueprint that made the quartet such a loveable bunch of rogues in the first place.

Tonight is a resounding success, and the first essential pop record of 2009.

Ultimately, Working On A Dream feels like Bruce Springsteen taking stock.

Svanangen reverts to a simpler, sadder approach. His initial cheer unexpectedly falls away into an introspective trance. Dear John is no worse for it. Sometimes you have to clear the air. It's liberating, if done right.

Merriweather Post Pavilion's rare combination of great songs and vital invention make this one of the year's most important records, already.