1/1 is much more than a curio, but there’s not enough pressure on it to make you unduly fret over how it stands up to the band’s great works. It’s kind of fun, and deserves to be taken seriously.

The album is certainly steeped in the synthpop and post-punk genres so associated with their feeder groups, so much of this album feels very much in its comfort zone: a solid and pleasing sound with few surprises.

It’s not just that Darwin Deez have recreated their first record, but made a more mature work, building on the intellectual learnings from the music they created in between.

A record light on substance but packed to the rafters with melody - there are plenty of cheap thrills to get jiggy with.

Liam Howlett and the boys embrace their psycho circus schtick on The Day Is My Enemy to the point of suffocation.

All in all though, Radio Wars is disappointingly average; pleasant but fairly forgettable, and in contrast to its misleading title, should really have been named Radio Friendly instead.

Essentially, if you like the sound of men that sound like they drink a lot and make a lot of bad decisions in life, have people die around them and then like to sing about it, set to a raucous soundtrack of guitars, drums and piano... then Strange Boys are pretty adept at all of those things.

With a little more pace and drama to offset this off-whitest of visions, El Perro Del Mar could be an interesting prospect indeed.

Here we have a garage-rock band with lounge-pop leanings. Which is fine - but that’s all.

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.

Excerpts is a work of forgetful minimalism; it is powerfully repetitious--perhaps, in waves, completely random.

Having heard Taylor's fingerprints over a dozen fine records, it's great to finally hear one that he can call his own.

With solid production throughout, there’s little to slight Public Warning besides Sov’s hang-up with her diminutive physical stature.

It's a pleasant enough experience on the whole, but could've been so much more--and that is what's so frustrating with Rituals.

Ultimately Into The Blue Again disappoints.

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

Its fervent technicality can leave it feeling soulless, lacking grit, bite or real emotion. It can become stifling and songs tend to blur together. But there are moments of beauty too.

This is an engaging, rewarding listen that promises great things in the future from our four heroes.

This is Acting has some good tracks on it and is obviously written by a very talented songwriter, it’s just not an album that demands excitement from its listeners.

It is all too easily consigned to background music if you stop paying attention.

You get twelve colourful washes of sound that work well on screen, but in terms of the band add up to not much more than a interesting EP.

It may not be perfect, or even great, but Pete Doherty has somewhat surprised with Hamburg Demonstrations by proving to a world increasingly less interested in his antics that, when given the chance, he can still pen a tune or two. Maybe just try including a few more 'bangers' in the next album Pete, eh.

All that really matters for the moment is that their debut album is an unqualified success, a concise and perfectly-presented collection of first-class pop music.

If you were a fan of Inside Llewyn Davis, this a great way to bring the film to life a little more and to expand on the world which inspired it, and also a quality live album in its own right.

While the revved motors and displaced robot pop satisfy your expectations, you find the virus progressing too quickly for you to evaluate its efficiency. A blue bar at the bottom tracks the virus’s progress to completion; you’re quite alarmed to see this already halfway full, as if someone twisted the fabrics of time in your ears.

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.

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

It's a decent enough, darkly-shaded mainstream pop album, but the concept is distracting.