Completely nonsensical, yes; yet also the perfect way of describing this album as the whimsy-filled journey through life it is.

It's a stunning collection of the most forward thinking dance and electronica I've heard all year.

It’s an excellent album by a band who seem to be permanently brimming with life and ideas, a glimmer of warmth to lighten the dark depths of winter.

Weekends is an inspired assortment of astutely executed ideas packed into 12 flowing pieces that deserves a wider audience than its likely to receive.

If familiarity breeds contempt, regularity breeds complacency, and Deerhoof's prodigiously consistent output should not overshadow how precious they are.

Overall Where the Gods Are in Peace is another solid album in a ridiculously exceptional back catalogue.

Putrifiers II is clearly a collaborative effort, and all the more delightful as a result.

With Emika, then, the hiding is over, her close-up appearing clearly on the cover of this varied and impressive 12 song record.

Talbot’s vocals mix with the music about them to become another instrument proper; messages are lost in the murk, but the fug’s an appealing blur nonetheless.

This isn't the best album John Legend or The Roots have made, but it's not going to go down as the black sheep of either canon.

Volume X certainly appears to have more than enough subtle moments and hidden delights to ensure its longevity.

On Dodge and Burn, Mosshart really makes the album her own and consigns White to the shadows.

From the filtered Cut Copy of "Hours" through "Adrift's" hip-hop tape signals to the final patter of "Elegy," Dive is a postcard from a pantone Miami, and a perfect memento for the summer weather we've all been deprived of in Britain.

Polymers Are Forever lurches, strives and sneers with all the subtlety of a bulldozer through the houses of parliament.

So it wasn't because Blur gave the most outstanding performance of their two-decade career that justified their rejection of what I'll call the Seymour route. It was the timing, the sense of 'crowning achievement', the feeling of poetic justice. As a document of that, Parklive is worth your money.

It’s as direct and aggressive as any of Halo’s floor-orientated material, and shows that, while she may turn more heads with more compositional, vocal-driven tracks, Hyperdub and Halo can move into new areas, one where syncopated drum lines break for vintage warehouse rhythms and the chill-out room has been invaded by pianists and a house DJ.

This record is better placed alongside, rather than in opposition to, Chardiet’s prior two releases. It’s another excellent entry in her catalogue of searingly distressing, and physically exhausting, noise.

Ultimately, Brothers of the Sonic Cloth’s LP is so tasty, it’ll have you unashamedly coming back for seconds, and thirds, and fourths, and dessert, and a cheese course, and just one tiny little wafer thin mint.

Goat Girl might be 19 tracks long but don't let that put you off. At just 40 minutes in length it doesn't stick around long enough to incur tedium, and what's more, each of its consistent parts makes for an explosive whole that demands repeat listens.

So, finally, to Farm, which every bit the equal of "Beyond;" maybe even better.

Micachu and the Shapes are fun. Their new album is fun.

It’s a record to get lost in, and to find yourself in. And to put it as plainly as possible: it’s a record as emotionally and musically rewarding as anything Cass McCombs has ever released.

This is a fine debut album.

While much of the album has you spitting out quicksand, the clear escapism theme of ‘Noah’s Ark’ is a hand dragging you out of the quagmire. And with the amount of misery The Body are offloading here, you’re gonna need a bigger boat.

Its their frivolous experimentalism and willingness to toy with all aspects of the past that make Girls such an invitingly warm and honest proposition

Rich and accomplished; beautifully played and immaculately conceptualised, Albarn’s latest trip from FitzRoy to Faeroes and back, via Dogger and Dover, is a drizzle-soaked deep-dive into a fractured land and fractured people. One of the quiet highlights of the year.

Overall, Rather You Than Me is another example of Ross’ gift at making albums, even though he litters the radio with corny one liners.

Testarossa is an album that gets better with each listen.

Ukulele Songs is an album brimming with integrity and enthusiasm and, most importantly, it boasts great tunes.

This is a superb album, and each time you listen to it you’ll find something new to like.

Apparently, lightning does strike twice. It has for The Go! Team at any rate.

Preferring patience and restraint over explosive blasts of atmospheric wailing, iLiKETRAiNS slowly build up these songs to climax, careful not to move to quickly to alter the mood that this entire collection expels.

What isn't in any doubt is that these compositions, from Hadreas' distinctive, fragile vocal through to the orchestration behind the compositions themselves represents a significant progression from the bolt-from-the-blue that was Learning.

This truly is an album you can’t just dip into, it’s a winning concept. And though it may not win millions of hearts, for those with time, it’s a truly rewarding experience.

The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart have crafted an impeccable debut way beyond their years, and any misconceptions about them being mere revivalists of a scene only their elders could recall at first hand will surely be diminished instantaneously upon hearing this most accomplished of long players.

For all the darkness of Actor's concerns, however, it remains an exceptionally pleasurable album to listen to.

It’s definitely not a ‘grower’, but you won’t love it for two minutes then leave it, either. Rather, it sits somewhere in between: impressively easy to like, refreshingly difficult to get tired of.

All told, Keep Moving is pretty much everything a second album should be. It takes the strengths of the first record and builds on them, it explores new ideas, and crucially it’s a much more cohesive musical affair than Slow Down.

These 20 minutes are of a higher quality than many, many bands manage in a whole career.

This is the best album Garvey has worked on since The Seldom Seen Kid.

Despite the difference between le Bon’s and Presley’s median outputs, they produce a fresh and rich stylistic centre on Hermits on Holiday.

The one-man band that is Rostam Batmanglij enjoys co-billing status here as the pair deliver a follow-up that goes bigger and better in the way that a worthy sequel should.

If it's pop thrills a go-go you’re after, you’ve got it.

There really is very little out there like this, and Demdike is a very acquired taste. If you've got the stomach for it then Elemental is their banquet - 18 nightmares you'll want to revisit.

'Almost Killed Me' is a rock album that is – above all – listenable and fucking energetic but never calculated and never sneering.

To give The Boss his due credit, the progress leading up to his debut album could not be better fleshed out.

What could have been a self-indulgent curiosity becomes yet another treasure chest waiting to be flung open amidst 2015's plentiful trove.

As a whole, then, A New Testament is a fantastic record. It’s almost certainly the most consistent LP that Owens has released in either of his incarnations in terms of the quality of his songs as well as stylistically.

Refined yet audacious both in execution and delivery, Pinkshinyultrablast exemplify sonic pulchritude. Despite its lengthy gestation, Everything Else Matters offers living proof all good things come to those that wait.

There are no duds here, though Bowie definitely misses the hipster mark on occasion.

While ‘Hustle And Cuss’ and ‘I Can’t Hear You’ rely too much on the practically prehistoric blues template White has employed throughout his career, the slinky stomp and lusty roar of ‘Gasoline’ and the crashing, panting, hair rawk solo-infused ‘Jawbreaker’ show that The Dead Weather have found the balls to break free of such constraints.

A carefully considered, exotic and mature record that stands out as a blueprint of how to handle the move from lo-fi to, well, just –fi.

It might be six years since the last album, but it was worth the wait.

'The Warning' will claim your souls and break your hearts.

It’s easy to overlook a few fizzles in an album stuffed with fireworks.

The Bees have made a record sparkling with enough wit and ingenuity to make the past seem an undiscovered country well worth visiting.

Awesome offcuts.

If it is indubitably more soundtrack album than bigshot solo debut, this record certainly provides irrefutable, definitive, official proof of O’s talents as a songwriter in her own right.

As with so many of rock's finer moments, the beauty’s in the overreach, and while newcomers to Krug’s idiosyncratic style may find it easier to warm to the more accessible leanings of the Wolf Parade record, for everyone else, this is essential stuff.

Thought Rock Fish Scale is one of the most enjoyable and insightful albums released this year so far.

He filters these gifts of poetry and keen observation through his bruised, romantic outlook, into a fully-formed album that sounds as if it was always in there, waiting to see the light of day. Or the darkness.

You’re listening to Jordan grow on Lush at the same time as you’re wondering how much room she’s left herself to develop creatively; she’s already sounding polished and bracingly mature.

It remains to be seen if Music Go Music can succeed in a world where platinum selling artists align themselves with paganism and performance art; perhaps they are just too relentlessly chipper. However, it would be a crying shame if people didn’t let Expressions light the dark corners of their heart at least once.

These are ultimately, however, personal stories that are elevated by their universal nature.

The heart of the album lies in the unparalleled excellence of Oldham’s songwriting – simple yet complex, understated and profound at the same time.

There is a classic aesthetic that underpins every facet of these recordings. Everything is calculated and nothing has been left to chance. So sit back, and fully immerse yourself in a sonic experience unlike anything else released this year.

All things considered, this is a record of high quality, and a vehicle for a storyteller of uncommon faculty.

When this album is good it’s superb--probably the Jicks’ finest yet; and when it’s less so--less focused, more haphazard and wilfully out-there--it’s still pretty damn great as well.

Eels may not tread any new ground musically (aside from being generally less noisy), but never before have we seen such raw emotion on show.

Whether or not it is as defining a release as OK Cowboy even feels somewhat incidental in the end, as Flashmob is easily the most enjoyable, addictive, air-keyboard-inducing electronic record that the year is likely to produce.

There is an effortless vibe to Astronaut Meets Appleman can only be gained from a career doing your own thing and not caring about chat places and record advances. Anderson appears to be happy in his skin and has crafted nine songs that reference his past, but also hint to his future.

This is easily Beirut's most accessible-sounding effort yet.

It's probably the most engagingly brilliant heavy metal album that'll be released on a major label all year.

Pantha du Prince has gone one further and created a piece of music that soothes and entices even the most impatient of modern ears.

Trouble is--in more ways than one--a far more mature album than their debut, and it’s also a far better one.

While Smith uses this album as an outlet to explore a variety of different styles, importantly he never loses sight of the source material. Even so, in paying tribute to a great artist, Jamie XX has laid significant claims to being deserving of that title himself.

An album which traverses exhilaration, desire, despair and loss and sees a songwriter finally completely on top of his game.

It’s little over 20 minutes long, and has incredibly sparse, softly organic arrangements, but Hard Rubbish succeeds in achieving a density which makes the LP feel twice its length, conveying the slowness of time spent in sorrowful solitude perfectly, and--most amazingly of all--succeeding in turning the absence of feeling into something intensely affecting.

If The Epic was a very large and rich meal then Harmony of Difference is a palate-cleansing sorbet or digestif. On the surface there is nothing unyielding or dense about it and everything flows together wonderfully, but once you start to scratch the surface you discover an EP that is full of hidden melodies and motifs and has enough to charm to make up for its brevity.

Given the gestation period and polish, the humanity that manages to shine through this tight, crafted record is a triumph; the sound of a band having a whole lot of fun in the hope that ultimately you will do too.

This record shows that they have the unerring ability to craft a record that sounds exactly like its influences but remains exciting and thrilling.

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross have made a soundtrack that is haunting, mechanical and beautiful.

Shapeless moments aside, Sleep Games emerges as a strong enough entry point in either Pye Corner Audio's discography or the murky world of Ghost Box.

All in all, Chiaroscuro is an engaging record that brings new flavours to the palette with every subsequent listen. Prepare to swoon...

Ultimately, Sex & Food is a very impressive record from not only Nielsen but also just to possess during these troubling times. There’s a lot to be scared about right now, but there’s also a lot out there to love, and thanks to UMO, we now have a soundtrack for that.

Their songwriting here, then, betrays not just a love for interesting sonics but hooks and harmonies too. Contrary to popular belief, they aren't just about obscuring their melody behind tape hiss and grungy no-wave like a lot of their similar sounding peers.

Setting out its tracklisting in almost chronological order of release makes Another Splash Of Colour an even more engaging listen.

Their songcraft proves singularly remarkable once more.

They’ve refined their scope to create an album that you want to blast out of your car, your house party--or ideally a boombox having been transported back to a street corner in Eighties New York.

Whilst so many hazy albums of this kind struggle to engage on a level beyond superficiality, Sea When Absent--if you’re willing to genuinely invest in it--throws up a plethora of fresh subtleties with every listen.

A great example of someone following their musical instincts into new areas and finding success, Bloodlines is also a highlight of the year so far.

You can hear the anxiety, claustrophobia and desperation pour from every fuzzy guitar, from every snarl. Yet it is also a remarkably upbeat sounding record, with infectious riffs, thumping drumbeats and an overall rich, joyous punk rock sound.

Where this album sets itself apart is with Roche, her contributions otherworldly and out of time, strange Wicker Man chants both charming and sinister. Her siren song laces Amen & Goodbye's best moments.

Spector balance out their miserablia with the kind of choruses that nag at you for days at a time.

Around two thirds of Theatre Is Evil's songs are bolted to the chassis of a loud, poppy guitar band, bringing inescapably to the fore Palmer's gift for killer-catchy melodies and stratospheric contrapuntal arrangements.

The real strength of the record comes in giving you that reason to come back to Nobody Wants To Be Here and Nobody Wants To Leave in a way that provides something new. If you loved that album, you’ll love this and probably prefer the original.

Some of Loscil’s best, most menacing, most uncompromising work.

Not only have they made a better record than their debut, they’ve made one of the best records of the young decade.