No Luscious Life exceedingly delivers on all the promise Golden Teacher have shown so far in their still relatively short careers and is perhaps the moment that breaks them through into a wider audience.

It is in this record’s opening salvo and in its closing stages that its aim, of reflecting the natural beauty of eastern England, where both Rogerson and Eno grew up, comes closest to being accomplished.

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.

There’s nothing inherently bad about anything on Losing, but nothing’s going to stick around, either.

Bypassing traditional melodies and obvious aesthetics, Mystery Jets have arrived at an unusually original pop album of the most exuberant order.

If gentle psych-pop is very, very much your thing, you may fare better with Jonny, but otherwise the overriding impression the album will leave you with is that it would have made a really strong EP with some judicious pruning.

Unbalanced and ill-executed at times, Hvarf-Heim is a supplementary release.

At just over half an hour long Innundir Skinni is a modest little record compared to the self-indulgence of Joanna Newsom's latest or grandiose ambitions of countrymen like Sigur Ros, but its charms are plentiful and in her own humble, but distinct, way Olof Arnalds confounds expectations.

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

The playing is astounding throughout, with Barnes and Trost turning a dizzying assemblage of strange instruments into a strikingly cohesive whole.

The result is a brilliant, imperfect record that affects you in ways Enter Shikari never have before and subverts what the entire band is all about. Anything from them would be ridiculous.

By the high standards of Mogwai’s soundtrack work--and therefore their work in general--it’s a bit tread watery. But it’s still bloody Mogwai, a band never less than magical.

Egypt Station is easily one of the most forward-thinking records of McCartney’s later career and a surprisingly welcome return. We might wish he could be more thoughtful and elegant in his older age, and maybe even a little bit cooler, but that wouldn’t make him Paul McCartney. Thankfully, he generally keeps his groan-worthy impulses to a minimum.

Genuinely, it’s the lyrics that are stopping Little Red from being properly brilliant.

It's an exceptionally accomplished piece of work that should place Matchbook Romance at the forefront of the cutting edge, POST-emo scene.

Future Politics is political, danceable, dark, shimmering and hopeful. Not a combination easily achievable, but Austra have never been a normal band. Utopia might be fiction, but Future Politics is real, beautiful, necessary.

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.

Rap paradise is paved with bad intentions and Key to the Kuffs disappoints by shying away from greatness where we've come to expect nothing less.

Musically, at least, Kings of Leon have matured during their two years on the road and, if you ignore some of the less than elegant lyrics, they have produced an acceptable second album.

In subduing and possibly internalising his animalistic anger and youthful vigour, the introspective search for his new identity is yet to bear any real musical fruit.

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.

For every full colour oil on canvas there are two doodles that fail to engage this sympathetic listener even after five or six plays.

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

There isn’t a bad album in the Whigs / Twilight Singers / Gutter Twins back-catalogue but Do to the Beast manages to be at once more varied in style and more consistent in quality than any of its predecessors.

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.

From the twin guitar salvos of Mark Goldsworthy and Liam Matthews through to Tom Kelly and Henry Ruddell's flawless rhythm section crowned by Mitchell's voice of reason, they're an unshakable and on this, their long-awaited first LP, an unstoppable force.

As a whole, 'Here Come The Tears' is a welcome collection of songs, even if the sentiment of it all does become a little saccharine-queasy after a while.

In Evening Air employs a clear formula where guitar and synth play off each other, where at points they're indistinguishable. It's this close partnership that gives the record an architected feel.