Ultimately Into The Blue Again disappoints.

If you love Shonen Knife wholly you will probably enjoy Osaka Ramones to some extent.

Takes never truly shakes the initial notion of a missed opportunity: failing to place a distinguishable spin on the material it seeks to celebrate, ultimately coming off a well-intended curio ticking as many boxes as it omits.

For every one of the album's fumbled subtleties, there are several moments when The Districts feint at being great. Enough to show they’re flailing in the right direction.

Contra is a solidly entertaining, well-constructed album, and if people take to it, the tendency to mock the band will, I think, fade, simply because it doesn't have obviously unfashionable moments to feel uneasy about.

There is a really great album rattling around in here and Howard's invention and ambition should be celebrated as such, it's just not quite at the level it could be.

The rest of the album has its moments, though mainly it seems like a chance for the GusGus gang to showcase what other electrified trickery they can muster.

It's Madonna's conservatism that drags her latest record down to the status of a ragtag collection.

The Leisure Society have certainly woven a kind of magic here, but with all their era-hopping it falls a little short of the climaxes of their live performances.

What the record lacks in the main part is a sense of urgency and excitement. Too often the songs wash over you, making no serious appeal for your heart or mind.

On casual listen it’s a perfectly pleasant electro-classical record. But despite the considerable technical talents of its creator, it could be by just about anyone.

Fourteen years on from their last outing, A Perfect Circle’s return to active duty as a living, breathing band is broadly speaking a good thing for the hard rock scene. Just don’t expect a record which silver plates their stellar reputation.

Tongue ‘N’ Cheek is a vacuous but fun party record, one that suspension of disbelief aids immeasurably.

Don't get me wrong, this isn't an Emperor's New Clothes review, just an expression of concern: there aren't enough reasons for casual listeners to come back to this.

It’s a pleasant mess, it’s well-meaning, and there’s enough pop here to satisfy the band’s fans.

Less pretension, more tickling the perimeter of pop perfection next time please, Planningtorock--you can skip the beer belly though.

Ultimately it is telling that the best song present here is a re-imagining of a previous smash. But leveling criticisms of unoriginality or lack of innovation and evolution at bands like BMFV is almost redundant. They're judged on the size of their hooks and in that department Temper Temper largely delivers.

That’s not to say this isn’t promising as a progression from the last album, with signs of grand ambition and more directions to explore.

While there are tracks of beauty and wonder, there are duller moments too, where the history that First Aid Kit derive their music from overwhelms their songs, reminding us always of what came before.

While the album at large maintains the lusciously rich production levels (a marked improvement over their prior LP, which was a stodgy and undercooked thing) there are frequent moments where a self-conscious attempts to inject ‘maturity’ into the song writing undercuts their former charms.

Despite its flaws this first solo offering is a human record; brave and honest, both in content and purpose.

If you’re looking for a neat musical reminder that David Crosby is one of the most influential men of his era--and can still sparkle with some of that same musical magic today, Croz is a worthy listen.

He lives and breathes it [music] like very little people today do, but for all the guitar work, humour, snarling vocals and at times great writing, there is consistently a level of cringyness that goes with it.

The chronological running order of Absolute Garbage is also unfortunate as it renders the CD impotent halfway through.

With a little more focus and a little less self-doubt, The Chapman Family's second record should easily surpass this still pleasing statement of future intent. Just so long as they don't take too much time recording it.

So slick is the production and so smooth is the transition from one moment to the next that Andorra suffers from an apparent reluctance to take us by the scruff of the neck and rattle us out of our mental Laconia.

While there are some lovely sounds on Somewhere Else... but it's hard not to yearn for something more.

There’s no doubting that sensory sensations offered here can hold the listener, but most likely they'll be enjoyed a helluva lot more while chemically-enhanced; essentially this is not a record designed for home listening.

In the hands of a different producer maybe the material assembled for When The Devil's Loose could step forward into something more Technicolor, as its faults are minor, but they are the faults which separate merely pleasant albums from great ones. As it is, When The Devil’s Loose is the former.

These layered, multi-directional numbers stand out rather than fit in. On either side are tunes a little too straightforward, big ideas a little too self-contained to really mesh in the way you want them to.

All the same, nothing hits with the same succinct and simple impact as early wins like ‘List of Demands’ or ‘Black Stacey’.

You can’t deny that their intentions are good, but Let’s Go Extinct really is just missing that certain spark that’s required to lift it above the middle ground.

You eventually wish they'd give the stadium anthems a rest and be more of that small band from High Wycombe.

If these average songs existed without the mercurial glow burning beneath the surface, you could unconcernedly dismiss it as another so-so album.

There's just so many country records being made, each a replica of another, that in moving away from Phosphorescent's original sound, much of Here's To Taking It Easy has found itself dangerously subscribing to banal convention.

Waterloo To Anywhere might not redeploy any cultural guidelines, but take it at its own merits and you may be pleasantly surprised.

Great in parts though it is, Magic Potion isn’t quite the album to attract a raft of newcomers to The Black Keys’ archaic rock.

It's a tighter take on pop than their early records, but as the storming energy that kicks off Heavy Mood begins to ebb away the group begins to feel oddly charmless.

Yet, as a whole, the record has one obvious flaw: it's dreary.

As a whole the record is coherent, but contrast, juxtaposition and the element of surprise are the missing pieces of the puzzle.

Tracks like ‘My Step’, ‘Feather’ and ‘Blinking Pigs’ have that unique ability to transcend seasonal musical folly, there's nothing 'now' or 'then' about them - you can listen to them any time, anywhere, any weather and still be pretty pleased.

The Birds of Satan is a fun record--it doesn’t aim to top the charts, be name-checked by politicians, or indeed supersede anything that the Foos have ever done.

Really guys? Next time, try a bit harder.

Liquid Cool is at its best and most interesting, though, when Gonzalez’s sound plays with the way our brains and human interactions have been rewired in the modern age, raising the bar by creating impactful moments via osmosis.

As a temporary deviation from Incubus's core sound, If Not Now, When? is satisfactory.

If anything, the stitching on Push/Pull is much too tight, the tone rigid even when things veer off in wildly different directions.

It’s just a little too saggy round the middle.

Too often, though, this record slips into a comfort zone that, while making it impossible to generally dislike, renders it hard to get excited about.

It stands alone as an album which is well-rounded--there's not much here which is lacking in quality, but much is lacking oomph.

Not that anyone really expected or wanted a laugh a minute, but whilst these 13 tracks are certainly eclectic in style, the atmosphere throughout, with the exception of the bubbling melodic analogue chug of opener ‘A New Error’, is almost uniformly bleak.

This is hardly revelatory stuff--the days of Sebadoh blowing minds and claiming hearts are now far behind them, but then maybe they don’t have to do that anymore.

Just as Interpol always seemed like a good imitation of a great rock band (no-one in particular, just A Great Rock Band, with all its slogans and hooks, and gestures and shapes), Julian Plenti does a fairly good imitation of a solo-artist showing his sensitive side.

Blood & Chemistry is a sound debut that despite its flaws, will whole-heartedly be welcomed by alternative rock fans.

An album that wouldn't be out of place if it had come out 30 years ago.

While the album concept may be flawed in execution this daring approach to composing and recording has resulted in an record which, regardless of its indulgences, is at least an intriguing listen and one which rewards patience with some moments of sublime ear candy.

The main problem with No Hope, No Future, though, is that very little here stands out above the accepted and expected norm. At times, there's a feeling Good Shoes have almost resigned themselves to a destined state of mediocrity.

Tellingly, Mark Ronson loves this album. Truth is, it's fine, and perfectly adequate, but nothing more.

The most positive thing to say about Walk the River is that it shows that Guillemots are still capable of producing beautiful, indefinable pieces of contemporary songcraft when the mood takes them. The most concerning aspect is that they're finding these diamonds increasingly scarce among the dirt.

On Rapture he’s traded atmospherics for dominating vocals, making the stylistic leap towards ‘tell don’t show’ music. It’s a move that will undoubtedly bring Tropics to a wider audience, but robs the listener of emotional nuance and understatement; everything that made him interesting, back when he was still making music in his bedroom.

A warm and personable record then, but one that doesn’t put its head above the parapet often enough to properly engage.

Nonkeen’s collective narrative may be charming, but more often than not the record fails to deliver on its many promise.

Civilian has just enough personality to stop it being completely pedestrian.

Aureate Gloom stretches spontaneity to the point of feeling rushed. None of these songs are among Barnes’ best.

So after the outré highs and lows of Grey Oceans have played their last syllable, it's hard to know what to think of it, apart from being slightly underwhelmed for the most part.

In its more luminous moments, it also contains enough to suggest that there is still a great album lurking somewhere underneath the Ladyhawke moniker.

Heady swirl, indeed: much of Come Into My House unfolds with all the knacker-shrivelling underwhelmingness of a tepid bath.

Something For All Of Us isn't going to change anything for any of us--Canning will go back to doing whatever it is he does in Broken Social Scene, Drew will remain its fire eye'd leader, and the Presents... series is profoundly unlikely to shift a single unit to anyone not already a BSS fan. But in his own quiet way Canning has both proved and defined himself.

The problem with ‘Push The Button’ is that it’s all so predictable.

Broke has instances of stunningly original songwriting and there's rarely a dull moment, but it's more a kaleidoscopic 'story so far' than a complete manifesto.

While each track sounds different to the one that preceded it, they all manage to fit together as a coherent whole. Barking is still a credible effort and a pleasant listen, but it is also unremarkable and, had it been released by artists whose fame didn't precede them, it probably would not have made any waves.

Birthmarks is probably the most impressive Born Ruffians record to date, but it’s a shame they travelled so far without straying from the middle of the road.

Röyksopp have always married darkness to their beats, but here, across more than an hour, it’s too unremitting to welcome repeat listening.

IRM is an album that refuses to cast Gainsbourg as the chanteuse some would like to see her as, and her willingness to gamble with her persona and musical style is laudable. However, this risk-taking attitude results in an inconsistent jumble of ideas that ends up being much less of a peek inside what it is to be human than the title might suggest.

Quicken The Heart represents Maximo Park settling into a rut, albeit an intermittently attractive one.

Although much of Heligoland suggests that Massive Attack might finally have burned out, the glowing embers of what they once had can still be glimpsed providing a light in the dark.

Resultantly, while the textures are nostalgic, the album is a very contemporary experience. Since you're unlikely to ever get the same 20 plus artists on the same page again, it's best to enjoy the album for what it is: a one-off experiment, more of a happening than a record, that can't (and possibly shouldn't) be repeated.

The message feels less than vital at a time when vitality is so needed, and no, there will be no revolution off the back of the subversive royalty involved in this release. The slogans feel thin, but the music itself is substantive. Whether that counts as a success or not comes down to what you came here for.

As a second album, it is perfectly acceptable and there are many aspects of it to admire. But the static present on much of Ceremonials cannot quantify the record as anything but a regression in broader terms.

While District Line is by no means a classic, it’s a decent addition to the catalogue of a man who could’ve lived out the rest of his days without lifting another finger

When you heard Cape Dory, you probably didn’t expect Tennis to be growing into soulful artistry six years and three albums later, and they deserve an incredible amount of credit for that. But you definitely wouldn’t ever have expected them to sound dreary either, and that’s something of which Tennis are slightly guilty on Yours Conditionally.

Akerfeldt should be praised for breaking free of an often repetitive genre--there's nothing wrong with radical reinvention. But this departure didn't need to be quite so lacklustre.

While The Enemy Chorus may not launch itself into the night sky and explode like the great big sonic firework it wants be, there are enough bangs on display here to warrant taking it out for the occasional stroll.

Like Within and Without, it's no overhaul, but Young Hunger has a much more immediate presence, more direct in both a melodic and emotional sense and generally with a lot more 'oomph'.

LNZNDRF lacks the deft, enchanting musical nuance of The National or Beirut but it does make for enjoyable, if not startling, interim listening.

In all, it’s an album with an admirable sense of ambition and innovation, a band pushing themselves sonically and lyrically in new directions; that they at times come up short is therefore a shame.

You can't take it too seriously--if you did you'd find an album riddled with clichés and vulgarities. Just take it as it was intended: 30 minutes of fun from one of the world's most entertaining rock stars.

If you like Mogwai for the sounds they make, for their instrumental dynamic and ebbing/flowing moodiness, you'll probably like Mr Beast - there's certainly little to object to. But if you love Mogwai... perhaps Mr Beast isn't for you.

As the album ends with disco floor fillers by The Ramones and Blondie by way of Yeah Yeah Yeah’s and Franz Ferdinand respectively, you know you have had a fun if not entirely unforgettable experience.

For all the sonic acrobatics though, it’s a record that feels like it’s missing something vital.

They try hard, Coldplay, but it just isn't enough; their fourth album might just be their best yet, but it's still a long way from being the epochal classic that Chris Martin is desperate to create.

It’s possible it just too hard to produce a record of straight classic songwriting in an era that has heard it all, but Blind Pilot make a good stab at it.

A couple of tracks at once would probably be the best prescription to suggest, rather than ingesting as a whole.

Sadly, the album at large is plagued by many of the things which have seeped into Folds' sound over the last ten years: the seriousness, the restraint, and the descent into middle age.

If there’s a problem with the album it’s possibly in the even-ness of the tone throughout. The vocals are soft, tuneful and pretty, the tunes are melodic and often hooky but it’s not until the second last track--‘Snaps’--arrives with a bit more attitude and grit that you realise that this is what has been missing up until this point. That said, almost every track here would work as a single, or heard by itself on the radio – they’re all decidedly easy on the ear.

[There are no] outstandingly bad offerings, just several more forgettable ones than can be briskly ignored.

Sequitur feels very much like a whistle stop tour of the history of ambient/electronic music.

It's frustrating, because if you took Our Ill Wills' best moments and condensed them into an EP we'd easily be talking an eight or nine, but as it is, the second Shout Out Louds LP is a Jekyll and Hyde record that ultimately flatters to deceive.

While sometimes left wanting for redeeming bells and whistles, where Big Bells & Dime Songs sporadically strikes gold is its distillation of tumbleweed folk Americana.