The alternative takes are uniformly excellent, with studio chat, and even a stray telephone interrupting Bitter They Are, Harder They Fall. Above all, In The Jungle Room revels once again how superb his voice remained to the very end. [Oct 2016, p.110]

There's something disarmingly joyous about it with only hints of the darker music that they also create. [Oct 2016, p.99]

This new nine-track album catches the duo performing together in Europe during 2011 and clearly shows that despite their infrequent collaborations, they create a special telepathic musical synergy in each other's company. [Oct 2016, p.97]

A zippy half-hour's worth of inspired, unlikely juxtapositions and deftly perverse songcraft. [Oct 2016, p.96]

We Move is warm, slick and modernist. [Oct 2016, p.96]

A series of richly textured, ambient instrumentals from pedal steel guitar. [Oct 2016, p.92]

Bowles apples his clawhammer style to reverberating experiments. [Oct 2016, p.100]

The main deal here concerns a dozen new tracks, deliciously delivered in that soulful quaver of a voice. [Oct 2016, p.92]

Opening and closing tracks Begin and Oh Men are breezy, playful electro pop, but for the most Gordon creates a variety of grand soundscapes to which the singer adds gentle, disembodied vocals. [Oct 2016, p.99]

Michael Collins' latest sounds like a 21st century Ween--knowing pastiches of '70s Laurel Canyon, '60s jazz soundtracks and more, with guests. [Oct 2016, p.100]

A ton of fun, just like the old days. [Oct 2016, p.92]

The result is 11 dazzling, fabulously hooky pop-rockers. [Oct 2016, p.95]

Peaks on Joy Division-ish New Structures and the helter-skelter title track. [Oct 2016, p.100]

There’s little that disappoints here, even after Jack’s parting of ways with Meg to plot a solo course.

Fingers Crossed marks another welcome return. [Oct 2016, p.98]

By finally abandoning the pursuit of making alt-rock sound as pristine as possible, Twin Atlantic have actually struck upon something much more significant here: their identity. [Oct 2016, p.96]

The 12 songs are dilatant, vibrant. [Oct 2016, p.93]

A burbling concept piece with moments of poppy and demonic. [Oct 2016, p.100]

An astute writer whose lyrics--frank, observational, brutally self-aware--make her songs feel deceptively simple. [Oct 2016, p.100]

A third LP of warm, retro pop jangle. [Oct 2016, p.100]

Up close and uncompromising, Exodus Of Venus elevates Cook into the top echelon of Nashville's new breed, an all-too-rare female voice among a a largely make elite. [Oct 2016, p.95]

Funny, learned and poignant by turns, Foreverland is a masterfully-arranged, part-chamber-pop record underpinned by Hannon's natural playfulness. [Oct 2016, p.93]

Astronaut..., then, could be King Creosote's finest hour yet. [Oct 2016, p.93]

It's a hugely inventive slab of sonic theatre plotted to the tiniest detail. [Oct 2016, p.99]

Amnesty's dark, metallic electro-pop creates an overwhelming Strum Und Drang. [Oct 2016, p.99]

Packed with airhorns, grunts and slashing keys, its tempo shifts at will, a reminder of a singular talent. [Oct 2016, p.99]

Bayley's lyrics--inspired by fly-on-the-wall over-hearings--add depth. [Oct 2016, p.109]

Alone, the music feels like a too-long experiment, albeit punctuated by lovely songs. [Oct 2016, p.109]

An album full of inspired electronic melody and pastoral reflection culminating in the heartsore title track. [Oct 2016, p.100]

Heat haze indie pop with Brit post-punk lyrical realism in place of slacker zaniness. [Oct 2016, p.109]

Here never becomes too cosy, there are also plenty of sparkling textural buzzes and blips to ensure that Teenage Fanclub's traditional consistency remains impressive rather than soporific. [Sep 2016, p.91]

Schmilco in particular is best consumed as a contemplative whole. [Oct 2016, p.94]

Away is a looser and more poignant than the band's previous releases ever hinted. [Oct 2016, p.95]

The results, like a digestible Oneohtrix Point Never, are gloriously sweet natured. [Sep 2016, p.93]

Olsen never gives into indulgence, however, her songs keeping their shape, their direction and their impact to the end. [Sep 2016, p.90]

It’s a beguiling, meandering sprawl that rewards total immersion.

Total Depravity strives to add something new to the mix but Andrews' habitual preoccupations keep The Veils from moving forward. [Sep 2016, p.96]

A multifaceted diamond that moves his gentle vocals between musical dark corners and soaring expanses. [Sep 2016, p.99]

Parrots invoke a woozy, enthralling chaos that's imbued with a golden, sun-blushed charm. [Sep 2016, p.99]

Opposite House and It are his most Succinct and affecting work since the near-perfect Wit's End, the album that Mangy Love now replaces as his finest. [Sep 2016, p.98]

Ghost Stations is blithesome evidence of Marconi Union expanding on their ambient/downtempo tag. [Sep 2016, p.93]

The 22-track vinyl's an ace place for newcomers to get electrified. [Sep 2016, p.107]

His voice is parched, so the songs, many acoustic and trailing brutal honesty, speak clearly enough to grip you in their gnarled fist. [Sep 2016, p.98]

A much more emotionally spooked record than either of its MOR predecessors. [Sep 2016, p.97]

It's an appropriately trying listen, far removed from 2010's relatively mannered debut. [Sep 2016, p.92]

Almost exclusively orchestral, this soundtrack works brilliantly as a half-hour suite. [Sep 2016, p.90]

A powerful intoxicant rather than just another retro genre exercise. [Sep 2016, p.92]

The on-stage versions bring genuine human warmth--healing even--to Vulnicura's raw emotional truths. [Sep 2016, p.99]

This joyous, head-spinning dash to beyond the end of the yellow brick road audaciously fuses the chamber chorale, folk, the theatrical and torch song to create an album which could soundtrack a cabaret hosted by the Wizard of Oz himself. [Sep 2016, p.98]

[Producer Bach shaped] fragmentary song ideas into sprawling, free-flowing arrangements that nod to Mark Hollis, Tim Buckley and Jim O'Rourke. [Sep 2016, p.90]

Thee oh Sees have never done ‘Thee oh Sees’ quite as well as they do here, a riot of lucid cacophony, androgyny, glowing vignettes of loveliness, and two drummers caught in the most sublime lockstep.

The whole shebang is a lovely thing to bring back to Real World, the label that first signed Arthur back in 1997. [Aug 2016, p.96]

Rattle's haunting weird-pop stands out like ghosts in the daytime. Spread over an album, truthfully, it's a trying listen. [Sep 2016, p.93]

They explore the tricksy time signatures and artful insouciance of Deerhoof or Tortoise with aplomb. [Sep 2016, p.99]

The Uzi/Live Skull/Come veteran conveys the therapeutic power of bleak yet lovely music. [Sep 2016, p.99]

Absolute Truth rights the ship with enough whistling milkman melodies to sink the Titanic. [Sep 2016, p.95]

And the Anonymous Nobody is another stroke of inventive brilliance from ever-humble, non-showboating masters of the long-playing arts. [Sep 2016, p.92]

Resistance to its charms is futile. [Sep 2016, p.93]

25 25's monomaniacal quest for the ultimate groove occasionally leaves the listener behind. [Sep 2016, p.96]

[A] polished second set by the Swedish '70s-inspired blues-psych outfit. [Sep 2016, p.99]

[A] fine and discerningly lean album. [Sep 2016, p.93]

Furnaces is an entirely winning proposition due to its high melodic content, making for Harcourt's best record yet. [Sep 2016, p.90]

They impress with a neo-Romanticism rather than basic rabble-rousing. [Sep 2016, p.99]

If you're mad enough to be planning a Breaking Bad-themed barbecue you've just found the perfect soundtrack. [Sep 2016, p.90]

It's foundations are suitably raw, emotional and, more often than not rhythmically muscular. And yet, by skillfully offsetting this by weaving in strands of Afro-jazz, the pervading mood is one of calming, introspective reverie. [Sep 2016, p.93]

The falsetto vocals can sound glibly glossy, but as mainstream alternative to Animal Collective they'll go far. [Sep 2016, p.99]

Wild Beasts' stripped down songs have developed incrementally into a more electronic direction and these finely detailed arrangements feature twitchy kit and synthetic drums, sequencers, abstract sonics, '80s keyboard stabs and guitars occasionally let off the leash. [Sep 2016, p.95]

Wildflower can either be enjoyed as a horizon-filling album-long trip, or by zooming in on the array of every changing, intra-song moments, as sounds and ideas flit in and out of focus. Whatever your preference, it was worth the wait. [Sep 2016, p.92]

It's Ry [Cooder] who handles the production chores and does that capably. [Sep 2016, p.94]

Sleepy Eyes is an immediate standout, as is the mellow but life-affirming title song. More playful is the excellent Two And Two Don't Make Five, a kitsch retro-groove spiked with humour and a funky organ solo. [Sep 2016, p.94]

Neville is in wonderful vocal forms ranging through lovely balladry, gospel, doo wop and funk. [Sep 2016, p.95]

The thread that binds is Tyler's enduringly impressive voice. [Sep 2016, p.95]

It could sound outdated, but instead, done with such panache and passion, it's very much alive. [Sep 2016, p.96]

His [Chris Collingwood] Kermit-does-Carole King voice can be too sugary for some, but not for high-spec pop fans. [Sep 2016, p.99]

With self-awareness and personal catharsis equally high on the agenda, everybody's favourite nerdcore veterans may not have grown up just yet, but they've certainly become better at acting their age. [Sep 2016, p.98]

Much of Give A Glimpse has the warm familiarity of a beloved sweater, but none of it sounds rote or autopilot. Mascis might be tending the same patch, but there's fresh flowers sprouting from that soil. [Sep 2016, p.88]

The cumulative effect is effortlessly gorgeous, if a little smoothed out compared to the variety and tension of the last two albums. [Sep 2016, p.96]

It's hard to imagine CRB ever re-inventing the wheel, but boy do they know how to roll. [Sep 2016, p.96]

The more you play it, the better it sounds. [Sep 2016, p.96]

[Manu Chao's] sonic tropes influence more than the three songs he appears on but Rose hasn't been around this long without knowing how to wrest the stage from the men in her music. [Aug 2016, p.94]

The album takes the artist to new territory. [Aug 2016, p.92]

Subversively moving. [Aug 2016, p.94]

Overall these are bold ideas rather than great songs. [Aug 2016, p.91]

Entertaining, at the very least. [Aug 2016, p.93]

She has moved into a more hospitable climate, where multitracking of bass-strung guitar, lap and pedal steel, electric piano and percussion have resulted in a warmer palette, a golden late-sfternoon landscape of long desert shadows. [Aug 2016, p.97]

A record to give reigning empress of dancefloor diversity Roisin Murphy a run for her hard earned. [Jul 2016, p.95]

With its children's choir,s its nods to Tears For Fears circa Songs From The Big Chair, and its Kanye and Kendrick Lamar-inspired production tics, the rest of Ellipsis also brings a fresh twist to Biffy's rampant stop-start riffage. [Aug 2016, p.98]

The result is fittingly breathtaking, a singer destroying his own work, yet creating something more elegiac and profound in the process. [Aug 2016, p.90]

The message songs are delivered from the heart. [Aug 2016, p.95]

Murphy has smartly subverted the dancefloor diva image, and these songs come from the uncanny valley, android beauty not quite hiding their off-centre menace. [Aug 2016, p.98]

Slightly fey at the start, this album gets better as it goes on. [Aug 2016, p.96]

Hit reset is stronger overall, because here The Julie Ruin fixes the spotlight on its raison d'etre, a woman who, in her own words, "can play electric guitar while shaving my legs in a moving car." [Aug 2016, p.94]

Power sings in an emotion-laden, ever-modulating voice that summons the spirits of Tim Buckley and Tim Hardin as readily as Sibylle Baier or Sandy Denny. [Aug 2016, p.93]

Singer-songwriter Ala.ni's debut story of doomed love is a hazy mix of innocence and experience. ... A pearl. [Jul 2016, p.97]

A bloody-nosed hardcore ruckus that makes no bones of its debt to Black Flag's vintage thuggery. [Aug 2016, p.97]

Sublime stuff. [Jul 2016, p.92]

William Bell has forgotten nothing, it seems, least of all how to make wonderful, eternal soul music. [Aug 2016, p.88]

A fascinating pleasure and a 21st century classic-in-waiting. [Aug 2016, p.95]