It’s definitely an accomplished one with plenty to recommend in its sonic traits.

This is music to be experienced, not read about or analyzed for political and sociological meanings.

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.

What we’re left with is an 8/10 EP stretched way past the point of interest, five or six songs in you start knocking half a mark off with every fresh coat of same-old. A worthy idea, but one you’ll rarely reach for twice.

x's first third is not without its issues but there is charm, not to mention the feeling that Sheeran really is trying to raise his game. A pity, then, that the remaining 35 minutes is alternatively as generic and simpering as it gets.

The total lack of sonic subtlety can feel kind of exhausting, on repeated listens, and if you prize music which purports to sound ‘organic’ or similar, this may make you puke blood. If nothing else, though, they’ve made an album which is unlikely to be mistaken for many other bands.

Gioele Valenti and Nicola Giunta have created an album that is not a gale, or a draught; it is an engaging, sonic zephyr.

In its own oblique way, Shaken-Up Versions is the sound of The Knife having fun.

It really is one of the best things he’s ever put his name to.

Once More ‘Round the Sun has lots to recommend it, but it’s a very safe LP that simply doesn’t provide fans with much they won’t have heard before.

There’s no staggering departure from Total Loss, but the backdrop for his soulful R&B crooning is becoming worn-out, and you can feel Krell auditioning replacements.

Love Frequency might not be enough on its own to lift us from the doldrums of EDM--but it’s always refreshing to hear dance music with a human heart at its core.

It’s not a brilliant record, but if there’s good one thing to be said about 48:13, it's that it sounds like a band coming to terms with who they are and who they’re making music for, tossing pretense aside, and concentrating on being themselves.

One or two missteps aside, this is exactly what 9Bach do with Tincian--creating an ambiguous mood piece from fragments of traditional Welsh music and contemporary tension.

Too often you can get a good read on a track in its first few seconds, making moments of genuine surprise a rarity.

The lack of cohesion is not a criticism per se, but rather a recognition that The Air Between Words is not really an album in the classical sense, as its parts are greater than its sum.

It screams often, confused, like the mess that it is.

As an album to invest in, feel sentimental about, or be genuinely thrilled by, Ultraviolence falls short. Take it simply as a sumptuously-presented pop record, though, and you have to wonder if you’ll hear a better one this year.

Familiars, then, is unsurprisingly, immensely moving.... But Familiars lacks any real musical inventiveness.

There is no slack, no flab and nothing that even comes close to pretension; the sharp sound and honesty come totally naturally.

Whilst Glass Animals excel at sustaining mood all that effort never really builds to any kind of release, just ultimately fading away beneath a queasy drape of melody and a frustrating sense of unfulfilment.

Thankfully, the album’s final act is as convincing as its opening movements.

International is brilliantly pop in substance and spirit.

CLPPNG makes a sterling argument for the intersection of noise and hip-hop tropes.

This feels like a deeper record than its predecessor, 2012’s well-received Blunderbuss, not as pretty but certainly sharper and more elegantly formed, something that’s reflected in the respective titles.

It might be churlish to suggest that First Aid Kit introduce some rougher edges or explore some other musical avenues, when they’ve nailed what they do so exquisitely. However, over time they’ll have to if they're serious about taking the roads their heroes have travelled.

Vek has channelled these emotions into an album that sporadically bristles and intoxicates with thrilling rhythms and fierce yet monotonously-delivered lyrics.

The witty and intelligent intimacy of his lyrics and his finely restrained vocals growing richer with each repeated listen.

It’s an oftentimes stunning piece of neo-pop that’s enabled La Grange to catch up with the zeitgeist that so eluded her two years ago.

Frost has ditched much of the subtlety and minimalism that echoed within his previous work and birthed a surging, hard charging, straight to the rim, go-hard-in-the-paint beast of an album.

Whilst materially an improvement on its predecessor, the move to electronica is superficial.

Confident song structures, accomplished, fearless vocals and beautifully put-together instrumentation, Heartstrings will coax the band's early fans into forgiving them for their previous offerings.

It’s a record without a weak link, that doesn’t outstay its welcome, and excites you about the possibility of seeing it all played live.

Sure, Abraham's vocal style guarantees an intense outcome, but Glass Boys drives forward, constantly questioning.

Somehow all these disparate parts click together and make Government Plates the most captivating Death Grips album yet.

To be honest though that’s an issue with Towards generally--that so much of this can pass by barely registering a memory.

Unlike its predecessor, this isn’t quite a thrilling record; its energy and invention, though, points to big things for Parquet Courts, especially if they can continue to adhere to such a ferocious work ethic.

Days of Abandon lets the songs breathe and ultimately speak for themselves.

In general, the songs that began life as full band, large productions numbers undergo Young’s intimate reimagining far better than the already bare-boned tunes.

Just like some of the better acts from that period, Breakfast suggests that Teleman’s music will stand the test of time.

Black Hours might be a tad scattershot, but it's held together with real spirit.

As a daytime collection of songs this album has its faults, but as long as it's consumed after hours, preferably in a club, it excels with a persona charged with swirls of unbound desire and dance friendly dazzle.

The tracks may not be anything particularly bold or new, but this formula has been honed for long enough to make them successful, largely at least.

Unplugged is another in a very long line of R.E.M. live releases you wouldn’t exactly call essential, if only because they set the bar so high with their concert films Tour Film and Road Movie. But things don’t have to be essential to be worth owning.

Definitely Maybe: Chasing the Sun provides a timely reminder why he [Liam Gallagher] and his former band are still held with such high regard.

Mark T. Smith from Explosions in the Sky and Matthew Cooper of Eluvium have come together as Inventions to construct something that leans on the ingredients of their day-jobs but is simultaneously exactly what a combination of both acts should sound like and somehow greater than the sum.

Do It Again is eccentric and ends too quickly, but those considerations pale next to the fact that within less than half an hour, Robyn and Röyksopp go from eyeing each other with genuine suspicion to sounding as if they’ve never been apart.

One of the most vivid, involving, troubling albums about the trials of love in recent memory.

It may lack the fictional cryptic storytelling of Pallett's past work but such elements were merely peripheral to the overall picture--this is art set loose on pop with its teeth bared.

The Sunshine Underground suffers from muddled ideas and rampant over-ambition.

Angel tells a story but it's nothing you haven't heard before.

They've constructed their most diverse and arguably finest collection to date in fourth long player Into Forever.

As a work of pure, confessional artistry it just doesn’t have the frazzled punch of the ‘great’ break-up albums, but if it did, it probably wouldn’t be Coldplay, and that would be a shame.

Every track has something distinct to capture the imagination, but it is the vocal range that is particularly interesting.

That sunrise-smile that hits before the first half-minute mark isn't blighted by the slightest smudge of cloud right up to minute 45, this is one of our best writers and the soul and centre of why he's always mattered so much. Heartily recommended.

Long time fans are going to lap this up while newcomers will likely be wondering where this band has been all their lives.

The imagery threaded throughout is at once arresting and functions on multiple levels, but perhaps its greatest achievements arrive in the form of songs like ‘Double Life’ and, pertinently, ‘You Are Your Mother’s Child’.

Galore is an odd proposition for a debut album. It feels more transitional than a definitive statement of who Thumpers are, and that’s a hugely exciting thing.

Under Color Of Official Right packs a dynamic punch from starting to finish, never outstaying its welcome at any point.

Shortwave Nights is a real enigma, and oddly addictive for it.

Hearing one of these songs by chance would be perfectly inoffensive, but listening to an entire album of them just feels like a chore.

In Music for Insomniacs Berry has created a synth fantasia of dreamy soundscapes for the wakeful, but with a greater dynamism and more grandiose scale and momentum than most ambient music.

Overall, Process is a ferocious if at times delicately poised introduction to the incendiary world of Yvette, sonic adventurists extraordinaire.

If you were hankering for a return to their garage-rock roots, then Turn Blue is going to disappoint; however, if you’ve liked where the band have gone since Dangermouse came on board, you’ll find plenty to appreciate here.

Featuring the ever-glorious Solange on vocals, it’s a moment of gracefulness that showcases Chromeo’s evident knowledge of when and how to take things down a notch. As a result, it largely accounts for the mostly-pleasant ride that the duo take us on with White Women.

The sledgehammer approach makes sense, in a way, but only if the satire is sharp and coherent. Too often on Sheezus, it’s not.

Although some of the themes and content of the music may be a little heavy, Dare uses the most basic of tools available to him and us as humans to express himself--words.

A two-hour odyssey of similar proportions to The Seer, this is an album that emphasises rather than establishes Swans' reconfirmed position at the top of the experimental rock tree, but that doesn’t make it any less of a thrill.

It’s another excellent Gruff Rhys album then, tied around an unusual concept but not bogged down by it.

As it stands though, data Panik etcetera is still a hell of a ride, and though new ideas aren’t exactly widespread across its 12 tracks, it gets its kicks from perfecting bubblegum-stomp electro party post-pop, and does so rather thrillingly.

Sometimes the sheer sumptuousness of the sounds, of Merchant’s cold, clear voice negotiating lush jungles of brass and cathedral-like groves of cello, is enough in itself. Sometimes, you can’t help but wish for more.

With such an unbending focus on intellectual ideals, Asiatisch is as erudite and wildly impenetrable as its maker.

At its best, it’s the purest yet expression of Garbus’ exploration of the corporeal: an album with sounds you can see, a voice you can feel, and music you can all but touch.

Luminous marks another fitting addition to The Horrors' increasingly untouchable catalogue.

Steeped in the postpunk aesthetic, a well-established rock style that nonetheless remains richer and deeper than any other in formal possibilities, this is a deceptively complex record that conflates doubt and optimism while at surface remaining aggressively articulate.

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.

All in all it’s a competently executed album that keeps your feet tapping and head nodding for as long as it lasts, but one that takes too few risks and bares too little soul to linger in the listener’s thoughts and emotions once it’s over.

I Never Learn is by no means a failure--the highs are grand when they come--but it has a tendency towards bombast and shallow self indulgence that sees it edge dangerously close to the fringes of mediocrity.

It’ll probably sound a lot better when it’s been beefed up and fleshed out live on stage, but on record this album does feel a little overshadowed by earlier moments of McBean’s career.

It’s an admirable attempt at maturity, but Diploid Love drains the energy from Dalle's music, along with its heart.

At 32 minutes, it’s a short album--but one whose brashness and pace you won’t soon forget.

May embraces the darkness and finds slithers of light shattered within. And while it might be haunted by a black dog, in Broken Twin's company, it's one that you too will want to walk alongside.

Die-hard fans of Civilian may be wary but after a few listens, this will sit proudly alongside some of the band's best work.

There are occasional lapses (‘I Run’ is textbook Embrace, and thus completely forgettable), and probably too few ideas to really sustain a record, plus of course Editors have made pretty much this exact album at least twice in the last ten years, but still--it’s a hell of a rug-pull from a band long written-off, and a reminder to some of us that everything should be approached with an open mind.

Everyday Robots is a lovely record, and in its lack of duds or whimsical twattery it’s probably one of most consistent things Albarn has ever put his name to. That doesn't make it the best, though: it doesn't take risks--not by Albarn’s standards, anyway--and in the most literal sense it's not all that exciting.

When all's said and done, there are worse things in life than being the fifth-best Pixies album. So I guess we'll just leave it that and say no more.

For the most part, though, Candy for the Clowns is very good fun; straight-up rock and roll, with no interest in pretension.

It’s a strange collage of effects and affects that sometimes don’t coalesce and sometimes do.

The outcome is both comfortingly retro and exhilaratingly fresh, a modern twist on a classic dish, the aural equivalent of Natalie Coleman’s 'pimped' roast pork belly and quail scotch egg that triumphed in the 2013 Masterchef final.

If you want an album that is easily digested, doesn’t require much thought or attention, but still ticks all the right boxes in terms of beautiful guitar playing and vocal work, then it’s the one for you.

Vezelay's sensual poetics melding into Rix-Martin and Paradinas' lush electronica on an album of retro-futuristic pop that improves with each spin and shimmers bright with widescreen radiance.

It's a shame The New Classic can sound so heavily manufactured, if anything because interesting things happen from time to time.

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.

There’s nothing on Undress that diminishes her as a songwriter; it’s just that it seems a mistake to strip some fine tracks of what made them so enthralling in the first place.

This album runs the same gauntlet as any best of: inevitably any one given will adore 50 per cent of the selections and being various-levels-of-nonplussed about the remainder. While the collection does slightly skew towards the contemporary material, May Death Never Stop You essentially plays out like an evolutionary tree of My Chemical Romance’s sound.

Sisyphus is almost certainly the greatest hip-hop folk-tinged electronica with a deep techno pop groove record you'll ever hear.

In its imperfections Amphetamine Ballads occupies an especially human place. Saviours of rock n’roll? Nah. It doesn’t really need saving, and anyway this lot are far more about destruction. A modern classic? Just maybe.

This project is evidently a labour of love for Polachek, allowing her to capture moods and ideas in the immediacy of the moment. But the result isn’t matured enough to be considered a definitive statement of artistry.