He’s Got the Whole This Land Is Your Land in His Hands is by no stretch of the imagination the most disagreeable Joan of Arc record to date, or the most impenetrable, either; some of the soundscapes here are pleasingly smooth given how scattershot Kinsella’s approach so often is.

The band remain an excellent and vital act, still producing worthy music which is head and shoulders over many similar, lesser acts, the problem, it seems, is that their evolution is a slow one.

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.

It’s crushingly disappointing from a band that can sound so much better.

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.

With Foxhole, The Proper Ornaments often make going through the motions sound like some revelatory train of thought.

The orchestra tries so desperately to stage this cool retro show, but there are so many glaring holes in the script.

This is a perfect introduction to new Gainsbourg fans and long standing followers will find plenty to get behind, it just feels that something might have been lost in translation somewhere along the lines.

Iris is that very rare thing: a soundtrack that can make a superb stand-alone listen.

You get lost in them but not in a good way, and the hypnotic nature of SOHN’s music makes it very easy to phase out, which is a shame, because the closing song, 'Harbour', is a raw and vulnerable gamble that pays off well.

The record will likely serve newer fans of Bonobo better than those that maintain a stronger fondness for his earlier work, but his journey is a fascinating one and only time will judge its permeance.

This is an album that could easily be subtitled Mission Accomplished, but for once, it feels like bowing out on top would be ill-advised. That, in itself, is quite the compliment.

The best moments on the album are the ones that grab you just as things start feeling too samey.

Welcome, Stranger!, unfortunately, leaves the listener largely nonplussed. And while a lot of these tracks are perfectly nice-sounding, it feels a bit tragic to consign a record by the Blue Aeroplanes to the background.

This record tames its chosen songs, moulding them into softer and smoother beasts, and producing altogether sanitised interpretations.

With Oczy Mlody, The Flaming Lips have managed to take us on apocalyptic journey that’s also fun, which is no mean feat. If the 'real' end of the world is half as fun, we’ll all be alright.

The set-list is a sprawling interweavement of new and older material. Wrigglesworth and J Willgoose esq take their time, lengthening out some of their songs, paring back and experimenting with tone and texture. The richness of the instrumentals gives a warmth that enhances the hypnotising quality of tracks such as ‘E.V.A’ and ‘If War Should Come’. ... It’s unfortunate, then, that PSB’s communication method of choice in-between songs is a set of pre-recorded audio snippets.

Ultimately, though, this is a more than solid album from a band who it was once assumed had given up. While nothing will compare to the band's exceedingly unattainable debut, it is refreshing to see the band learn from their mistakes on Coexist and create something new and intriguing, but still ultimately them.

Whether they choose in the future to extend their reach into more abstract or formless areas is up to them, but there are signs here that it could be fruitful for them. Nevertheless, as a debut album, Mechanism displays two musicians with a clear facility for evoking visual landscapes and narrative drama.

Their output remains honest, unsullied and socially conscious--it’s still got all the bark and bared teeth of a Boston terrier, and the drinking songs are still out in force, but there’s a message of hope at its core that espouses all the values that are held so dear to the contemporary punk scene.

It’s the kind of album that restores a moribund set of ears into the the place of loving music and all it has to offer, once again. It really does have the potential to draw in fans of multiple genres around the love of one band.

Action Time Vision... covers a seminal time when anything seemed possible and a special kind of never to be repeated excitement hung in the air. For those reasons alone this box set is worth anyone's time and money.

Just when you thought Reznor and his obscenely large biceps had been plugging away far too long on what was essentially a Nine Inch Nails tribute act, he sets things straight again with an original, well-produced, no-bullshit record. More of this please, and less of that other stuff.

Reflection is quintessentially Eno. A beautiful, thought provoking and introspective body of work that is composed in a way that is still as unique and as radical as the man himself.

Everything from the minimal arrangements, to the briefly heard flutter of a page turning draws you into the world that Jófríõur and Ásthildur inhabited when they were making the album. They may have been apart for a while, but Sundur is proof that the musical connection between the two sisters is as strong as ever.

Ultimately Life On the Road can only work as a comedy project, and musical comedy needs to be richer than this to be worth visiting more than once. You need to be Flight of the Conchords to pull that off, and David Brent just isn’t likeable or interesting enough.

What we get is an interesting departure from his usual work, but not interesting enough to create the eternal music that he is talented enough to execute.

There are moments where the live dynamics allow the songs to hit a few more buttons than the studio recordings did, but ultimately it was an overwhelmingly visual show and it feels like everything here is lacking its USP, no matter how good it is.