The swooshing, intricate Doll's House might be The Orb's purest house moment yet, preceding a closing brace, Under The bed and Kharon, that represent ambient Orb in excelsis. [Nov 2025, p.91]

A lean collection of blues and ballads accentuated by discreet overdubs by the surviving members of Waylon's backing band The Waylors, along with some occasional new blood. [Nov 2025, p.101]

Blight is powerful, but hermetically airless. [Nov 2025, p.91]

The LA portion of the album is a noticeably better recording - the drum sound has improved for a start - and it's a high energy show featuring William Bell and Carla Thomas. [Oct 2025, p.94]

Freak Out City owes little to Flight Of The Conchords, but much to '70s US songwriters with a kitchen-sink production. [Oct 2025, p.89]

The songs are charged with love for both the music and Molina. [Oct 2025, p.80]

Don't head here for untrammelled novelty, but Idlewild is a record worthy of the name. [Nov 2025, p.89]

It's stunningly polished new take on their heavy concept album. [Nov 2025, p.98]

Frustratingly for JM solo-heads, as well as Neil Tennant hanging around for a superfluous Rebel Rebel, instead of The Messenger we get The Passenger. Top notch performances, though. [Nov 2025, p.87]

Amanda Shires has made the year's most emotionally raw album. [Nov 2025, p.86]

He reinterprets key moments from his back catalogue. [Oct 2025, p.87]

The humour enhances the band's vigour: loud and ragged, they sound like a band much younger than their years, although the high quality of songcraft is a giveaway of their veteran status. [Nov 2025, p.93]

This stately, sometimes gospel-esque, album has the forceful intensity of a coiled spring. [Oct 2025, p.84]

The groove here is mostly grainy, organic, natural. [Nov 2025, p.83]

The folk-adjacent auteur’s ninth studio LP is alive, Natalie Merchant-style, to the marvels of creation, but also the vulnerability that comes with suddenly having a physical stake in the future of humanity. [Oct 2025, p.88]

It's Orcutt's genius to find tenderness in the most forbidding places, and this time out he does so in the best possible company. [Oct 2025, p.85]

There's some really good songs here - Creature From The Wild is classic Fruit Bats, Moon's Too Bright is a beauty, and so is his moving cover of the Incredibke String Band song First Girl I loved - but the overall feeling is of an abandoned demo album [Nov 2025, p.93]

Another exquisite recording documenting the near-telepathic connection between guitarist Oren Ambarci, bassists Johan Berthling and drummer Andreas Werliin. [Oct 2025, p.86]

A third album bursting with intense energy and sparkling invention. [Nov 2025, p.85]

A lyrically rich and musically colourful set of songs which is as emotionally exhilarating as it is often rawly painful. [Nov 2025, p.88]

Yes, they're flavour of the month, but they're the real deal too. [Nov 2025, p.88]

It's a beauty. [Oct 2025, p.81]

Across 10 intimate songs deftly ornamented by guitarists Matt Worley and Tony Kelsey and cellist Barney Morse-Brown, magic happens. [Nov 2025, p.88]

As a triple record, there are tracks that are less necessary than others, but remarkably it all flows as a cohesive whole, and never loses the listener's attention. [Nov 2025, p.80]

From labyrinthine opener Men In Bed, the material is inimitably Smith-esque, and if it is tempting to dig for premonitions of mortality, the Frank Zappa-via Hanna-Barbera thrills of Busty Beez or Skating feel like the work of a very much living artist. [Nov 2025, p.89]

Lots here is clever and fun, and maybe Oh Snap is an album she needed to make, but heard end to end it's a bumpy ride. [Nov 2025, p.86]

Band kiss-and-makeups can seem contrived, unconvincing; but this one feels genuine and sparky, Biffy's urgent, passionate music oxygenated by time away. [Nov 2025, p.83]

These 14 songs mostly charm and world-build in under three minutes. [Sep 2025, p.79]

A likeable collection of songs about family and companionship. .... The happy point where Belle And Sebastian meets Stephen Sondheim. [Nov 2025, p.88]

Captures Radiohead during their majestic 2000s, delivering muscular, meticulously detailed material to an audience eager for rousing, off killer anthems (There, There) and piano-led laments (We Suck Young Blood) alike. [Nov 2025, p.101]

Wednesday sound in total control of the world they've build here. [Nov 2025, p.85]

Throughout the record, there are audible seeds of the sublime AOR sound that Nicks and Buckingham-era Fleetwood Mac would further finesse. .... It's also easy to hear why Frozen Love - the proggy, shape-shifting holy grail of Fleetwood Mac's most combustible couple - so impressed Mick Fleetwood. [Nov 2025, p.96]

Arctic Moon does not have the glowering intensity of the band's earliest work, but fans of 1986's Strange Times will appreciate its subtleties. [Oct 2025, p.90]

A low-key exploration of how delicate melodies, processed noise and the occasional beat can intertwine, When It Rains drifting artfully to uncompromised skronk. [Oct 2025, p.83]

Hannon's most personal and poignant album to date. [Oct 2025, p.86]

Honeydew is one of Ritter's best. [Oct 2025, p.84]

It doesn't always hit the bullseye - Te Tragaste El Chicle's intense shredding veers towards '80s hair metal, or the soundtrack to a Jerry Bruckheimer movie - but the dizzying ideas on display amply compensate. [Oct 2025, p.81]

Even with zero knowledge of what is going on lyrically, these songs are often beautifully evocative. [Oct 2025, p.85]

Scrappy, heartfelt, yet utterly beautiful, it's a fitting farewell from a unique talent. [Oct 2025, p.87]

The songs here are among his most direct and fully focused. [Oct 2025, p.81]

A deeply satisfying tribute to a great lost talent. [Oct 2025, p.90]

With this fluid, free-raging music, Raymond is in a world of her own - one with several moons and its own intoxicating atmosphere. [Oct 2025, p.85]

Same old boots, maybe, but significantly racier kecks. [Oct 2025, p.88]

The album captivates wen his bad keeps pulling Freeman and his florid drawl back down to earth, the tension creating a form of transportive rural psychedelia. [Sep 2025, p.79]

Intergalactic longing underpins Banh Me, its closing synth solo reaching blindly, hopefully into the endlessness of Space, while Out In The Black finds his Captain Curt using his isolation amid the stars doe some powerful internal reckoning. [Oct 2025, p.84]

Unlike the four prior archival editions, Joni’s Jazz gives listeners very little that’s new. .... It is tempting to see it, then, as a chaotic but mostly coherent and sometimes very compelling streaming playlist, given deluxe physical form. [Oct 2025, p.46]

Throughout, Dalt's sensuous vocals, which flip between Spanish and English, are buttressed by inventive use of Alex Lazaro's percussion in rhythms from Dalt's home continent. [Sep 2025, p.87]

Walker's narratives land like a looser Lucy Dacus or a more skittish Craig Finn (especially on the regret-buckled Bitter Root Lake), her voice shat=ring the fur-rubbed-the-wrong-way scratchiness of Jeffrey Lewis or Kimya Dawson. [Sep 2025, p.85]

Weirdness and wonder abound at every turn. [Oct 2025, p.81]

10 moving gems of adult experience. [Oct 2025, p.90]

The whole is deeply bittersweet - but also a joyous farewell from this most wonderfully acute of English pop ensembles. [Oct 2025, p.80]

These songs convey a sense of the work put into them, a sense of the world outside, but that doesn't undermine Big Thief's ability to lock in on something profound. [Oct 2025, p.78]

This defiant, death-defying record - as much joyride as memento mori - is the glorious reward. [Oct 2025, p.80]

Not a thrill a minute, but a steady antidote to chaos. [Sep 2025, p.83]

What's compelling is the precision and control of her voice, moving from a whisper to a scream on tracks like Broken Rib, or the industrial glam stomp rocker No Good For People. Lyrically, too, she has honed her songwriting skill. [Oct 2025, p.93]

Hard Headed Woman sees her big personality fire straight-talking, sometimes blackly comic lyrics "All the cocaine in existence/Can't keep your nose out of my business" - while taking her music to new places. [Oct 2025, p.82]

An electric chemistry courses through the line-blurring electro-acoustic hybrids of Hyperglyph. [Oct 2025, p.89]

As much as his guests shine amid his contemplative synth odysseys, it's the solo Njoku, stripped and vulnerable on Weapon that cut closest to the bone. [Aug 2025, p.84]

Richman sings with jaunty assurance in I Was Just A Piece Of Frozen Sky Anyway, the near-title entrance to his eighteenth solo album. [Oct 2025, p.86]

Gush's sticky, slightly unsettling sensuality suggest Smith is on a serious mission to get right under the skin if human connection. [Sep 2025, p.84]

Crowell's clear eye for detail is evident throughout, but what gives the album its kick is the lean, clean attack that allows both barroom ravers and haikus of Zen wisdom to linger in the imagination. [Oct 2025, p.89]

If the lyrics deal with wavering states of mind and quiet struggles, though, the music is sharp and direct, echoing Belly or Tsunami but also keeping pace with Lucy Dacus or Phoebe Bridgers. [Oct 2025, p.88]

EURO-COUNTRY is everything great pop music should be: smart, subversive and tremendous fun. [Oct 2025, p.88]

The title track, inspired by the band's current motto, is a powerful evocation of The Strokes going electro, while Path Of Most Resistance taps a kooky, Devo-ish guitar hook. If Your gym playlist needs refreshing, look no further. [Sep 2025, p.82]

Sherwood's most thrillingly exploratory solo album so far. [Oct 2025, p.83]

Altogether, a bold and beautiful record. [Sep 2025, p.78]

"Surprised" might not be the answer, but these big, generous songs still land an emotional punch. [Sep 2025, p.79]

Unabashed clever buggers, their seventh is where Water From Your Eyes let their hearts rule, and it's a glorious sound. [Oct 2025, p.86]

There's no arguing with Fogerty's singing either - nor his distinctive guitar; part anger, part mad joy, like he's playing mid-Apocalypse. As for the arrangements, they're pretty much can't-believe-it's-not-Creedence. [Sep 2025, p,86]

Shows[s] significant growth from 2023's more dream-poppy debut Erotic Probiotic 2. One senses this twisted R&B Baby Bird has even more in the locker. [Sep 2025, p.86]

Throughout, singer Ellie Roswell is a compelling presence, and the result is Wolf Alice's best yet. [Oct 2025, p.80]

Another of those Mac DeMarco LPS wherein a deliberately spare palette pays dividends. [oct 2025, p.90]

A delightful collection of woozy, folk-tinged, hallucinogenic pop. [Sep 2025, p.83]

There's some beautiful songs about the road. .... Opening track Everything Burns has a dark mood and some great guitar - Tuttle's guitar playing is more up-front on this album. [Sep 2025, p.81]

New radiations is not without moments of ponderous stasis. Nadler still shines as a spell-weaver and mistress of moods, though. [Sep 2025, p.79]

There are startling moments: the title track’s D&D blues-rock, for example, The Groundhogs doing The Tempest in a nasty basement; or Juvenile’s ice-rink keyboards, McCombs ennobling and mocking adolescence (“You suck/I suck/Primus sucks”). Other songs, though, creep up more subtly, such as Miss Mabee’s Elliott Smith hush, or Peace’s heartbreaking Go-Betweens valediction. [Sep 2025, p.80]

Though the full potency of this band is only ever manifest live, ABOMINATION REVEALED AT LAST - the Osees' 8th LP in five years - bears thrilling testament to their appetite for insurrection. [Oct 2025, p.88]

Highlights: Bird On A Swing's Glen Campbell moves and Lou Reed's gorgeous tribute to a "tai-chi Master". [Oct 2025, p.91]

The results are less out-there, but mostly play to Allison's strengths. [Oct 2025, p.91]

Flux lacks a little of the old uncanny razzle dazzle, but there's no doubting the elegance of its execution or the expertise of its creator. [Sep 2025, p.79]

She takes memories and splashes them around in them, a style she's made her own. Hokey, lo-fi acoustics and a fluid off-key croon add a surreal edge. [Sep 2025, p.86]

All The Young Droids has something for all manner of vintage synth fiends. [Jul 2025, p.97]

The 13 tracks gallop along, urging listeners and musicians to stand up for what's right and take the fight to the forces of oppression. [Sep 2025, p.86]

Altogether Stranger is a significant upgrade and these dystopian but hopeful, image-drenched songs are surely the way ahead for an artist who's becoming special. [Jun 2025, p.82]

The Black Keys’ raw edges are retained amid the Hendrix fuzz of Man On A Mission, while on the slick, Philly-shaped soul standout Make You Mine, the pair soar to new poppy heights. [Sep 2025, p.79]

The trio return with 12 mesmeric tracks that are a love letter to their native south Manchester and its iconic brutalist architecture. [Aug 2025, p.85]

Funny, thoughtful, pragmatic and whimsical, We're Only Human is a perfect alt-country album [Sep 2025, p.84]

The opening Witness introduces philosophical detachment which anchors Oliver's sceptical worldview throughout as he hovers between the sanguine and the sly on rousing yet playful anthems like the title track or the funky The Trick.[Sep 2025, p.84]

This is a thoughtful, artfully curated release that furthers the artists' reputation. [Aug 2025, p.93]

Both the Entermedia set and the alternate takes underscore how much the studio shaped and sculpted these songs. Like the etiolated, unstrung Polaroid band portraits on the album sleeve, there’s a lack of connective tissue in these versions, the alternate Found A Job lacking the delirious carnival sheen of the album take, the live Artists Only missing the full cinema-matinee drama of Jerry Harrison’s moustache-twirling keyboards. [Sep 2025, p.88]

Their ability to serve up soulful, clearly hard-lived songs - think bespoke merge of Gram Parsons, Glen Campbell, Todd Rundgren, Fleetwood Mac and Supertramp - without sounding kitsch is quite some feat. [Sep 2025, p.83]

Worth the wait. Her voice is on excellent form and her band has its understated arrangements down to an art. [Sep 2025, p.82]

An exquisite, arresting introduction. [Sep 2025, p.85]

The result is like two rock esotericists in a bunker alchemising to compelling effect. [Sep 2025, p.84]

Choruses swell gorgeously but unpredictably out of the continual wordplay and there's occasional moments of musical reverie. [Sep 2025, p.79]

The superior ones are palate cleansers or re-fertilisations of barren songwriting soil. But the best are things in and of themselves – artworks the performer has shaped just as surely and idiosyncratically as the writers. Find El Dorado is one of those. [Sep 2025, p.76]

The Manticore Tapes constitute an alternative history showing just how potent early Motörhead really were. [Aug 2025, p.92]

Cobb as a blockbuster album in him, but not quite yet. [Aug 2025, p.79]