There may be less outsider allure now that he’s opened his heart, but his fourth consistently good LP in a row casts his authenticity in emotional honesty for the first time while expanding his musical palette beyond all expectations.

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.

Born Under Saturn sounds like what it probably is: a bunch of smart musicians having a great time.

The album only features nine tracks, but somehow still contrives to feel over-long and lack cohesion.

The version of the band audible on their second album is one that's on a sugar high and fuelled by a desire to create loud and fast music that doesn't skimp on the hooks.

Beautifully brutal weirdo punk.

As the record progresses, however, it’s hard not to feel that the band are using the same tricks over and over again. This not only makes the second half of the record intrinsically less vibrant on first listen than the first but also undermines earlier tracks on repeat listens.

Away from the lyrics, there’s a nagging feeling that, like The Only Place, California Nights isn’t going to blow too many people away with its mostly familiar-feeling content.

The boisterous, almost-live feel of the production, and a leaning towards big, striding choruses and unashamedly anthemic moments means that things never get too ponderous.

Although there’s a vogue for the vintage production techniques and comfortable imperfect noisiness that pervades the record, it doesn’t always do American Wrestlers justice.

It can be a slightly heavy listen but when you’re as good at it as he is, it is fine to embrace it.

Musique de Film Imaginé isn’t quite the most moving album you’ll ever here, but, more than most, it works.

This is an important--a very important--piece of work that will stand the test of time. It’s also an utter blast to listen to and live with.

Overall then, a triumph for instrumental music that’s more than genre-hopping: it’s genre-reviving.

In lesser hands, it would simply be an unfocused scrappy mess, but Braids have taken all this and managed to create one of the finest records of the year so far.

Disquiet, the group’s fourteenth album, is their most direct and to the point release in some time.

If you like Mew, you’ll like this. If you don’t like Mew, this is as good a place as any to begin, or to rekindle, your love affair with a wonderful band.

It is an almost endlessly intriguing record, full of mad ideas, strange microhooks and an air of rich elegy that just works.

You may not get on board with it as quickly as Gossamer, but it possesses greater replay value. Angelakos has made an album celebrating stability, and it'll be interesting to see what happens next.

Constant Bop has an air of effortless accomplishment and fresh brilliance, which can only come from hard work and a fastidious attention to detail.

With its genre manipulation and intensely poetic, socially aware lyrics, Foil Deer is a stronger, more assertive record with more to say for itself.

Escape from Evil might not change the world (unless you live for slightly off-kilter Eighties-style pop records, in which case, you should be thanking Lower Dens immensely), but it is all the more impressive because of its unexpected accessibility.

Marriages know what they're about, and have crafted an album for all seasons that still possesses a distinctly autumnal sound--an accomplished record that will provide the ideal soundtrack once summer's over.

No Pier Pressure shows just what too many cooks can do to a Beach Boy's broth.

At its best Sound & Color is very strong indeed.... Elsewhere it can be a little business-as-usual.

Royal Albert Hall is bursting at the seams with superb reinterpretations of some real classics.

The Southern gothic touches strewn throughout the album help make this their best set of angry anthems to date.

Beautiful, if rather impenetrable at times, Sonnet succeeds when holding back - teasing soft, sometimes brittle melodies through reverbed layers of atmospherics, giving just enough away to engage and envelop.