Not everything hits the mark. [Aug 2016, p.98]

A tad less confrontational than previous Pita releases but no less powerful. [Aug 2016, p.97]

While this ninth LP retains Plaid's signature style, it also offers far more range than dependable recent outings Reachy Prints or Scintilli. [Aug 2016, p.96]

The intensity of MC Dalek's worldly-wise apocalyptic wordplay on Guaranteed Struggle and Masked Laughter (Nothing's Left) help reinvent their trademark sound without sacrificing its essence. [Aug 2016, p.95]

Drake's genuinely fleet-footed flows and sly humour prevent his pained introspection descending into a cheesy whine fest. [Aug 2016, p.95]

With more hits than misses, Shadow is back in the frame. [Aug 2016, p.95]

Expansive and coherent, yet always subterranean and claustrophobic, this is easily Fearless's finest hour. [Aug 2016, p.94]

Life In The Dark constantly threatens to fall apart at the seams but the Felices miraculously hold their world together, the greatest campfire band imaginable. [Aug 2016, p.93]

Doubtless, it will all sound great in the car. [Aug 2016, p.93]

A challenging listen. But such is Blake's sonic invention and flair for extricating beauty from the murk, it's well worth sticking with. [Aug 2016, p.92]

Locally focused yet state-of-the-nation, in their inventiveness and force such songs as Working Poor, Lost In A Crowd and The Worst defy pessimism, good art in bad times. [Aug 2016, p.92]

The only problem is that her lyrics are sometimes relegated to back-drop status as Jarosz creates an array of enchanting sounds, set against harmonies provided by back-up musicians Jedd Hughes and Luke Reynolds. [Aug 2016, p.92]

There's often been a whiff of contrivance around the Avetts, but by coming of age they come up smelling of roses. [Aug 2016, p.92]

There is a single-minded intensity to the writing and the production which makes The Bride a very strong proposition indeed. [Aug 2016, p.91]

Gorgeous from beginning to end, Luck Or Magic is evenly split between originals and covers. [Aug 2016, p.91]

While outstanding musicianship is guaranteed, it doesn't always go hand in hand with great songwriting, but by its judicious mixing of the avant-garde and smart pop, alt rock and low-slung funk, Patience is always engaging. [Aug 2016, p.90]

The 13 eco-friendly songs from across his career are augmented to varying degrees by nature sounds: rain, thunder, frogs, horses, ducks, crickets, chickens and several critters I can't identify. Sometimes intrusive but they're often atmospheric. [Aug 2016, p.90]

There's some blurring over 17 tracks, but as a whole piece, Freetown Sound is a record with unusually sharp focus. [Aug 2016, p.90]

This album isn't shy, but the jittery electro-pomp and lyrical cleverness can feel off-puttingly arch. [Aug 2016, p.90]

There's more meaty and time-honored blues extractions on the title track and the four-square Zeppelinism of Black Coffee, but somehow, particularly on Fade Out's balladic angular grind, these journeymen lack the emotional oomph to tear your heart out, or, indeed, shake your money maker. [Jul 2016, p.96]

It's the lesser-spotted Mike D and Chan Marshall aka cat Power who snag this troublesomely titled fourth album's crowning moment. [Jul 2016, p.92]

As confident a second statement as you could wish for, full of strong melodies, affecting lyrics, sharp playing, immense arrangements and sympathetic production. [Jun 2016, p.86]

Each piece worms in and stays there. Brice has enhanced the voices of others for too long. Now, her own needs to be heard. [Jul 2016, p.91]

Blood Moon seems like Craft's real start, and one of the most exquisite soul-searching odysseys of this or any year. [Jul 2016, p.93]

The result is confusing, as with any roots artist messing with synths and beats. Even so, when he doing his familiar stark, keening vocal and raw country-blues thing and sentimental lighters-aloft pop, he's still deeply impressive. [Jul 2016, p.92]

These tracks chose to morph and mutate rather than petrify in any sense. [Jul 2016, p.92]

It's audacious, experimental and, unsurprisingly, resists literal interpretation. [Jul 2016, p.94]

Just a tad more quirkiness would be welcome. [Jul 2016, p.92]

This compelling, enlightening aural history gives [lesser-known artists] a worthy platform. [Jun 2016, p.102]

Several of the songs on River are, aptly, long and meandering, passing the ears in a liquid, ungraspable way. You can drift away on it. [Jun 2016, p.104]

Featuring a previously recorded vocal by Davy Jones, who died in 2012, it’s a match for any of their ’60s hit 45s. It also features all four Monkees, the only song of the 13 here to do so. The remainder, penned by the group, musician fans and long time cohorts, feature Tork, Dolenz and Nesmith and for the most part recapture the enchantment of the original group.

Much of Why Are You OK may be lush and beautiful, but there are too many rambling tracks to put it up with Bridwell's best. [Jul 2016, p.95]

Less of a musical therapy session, more of a celebration. [Jul 2016, p.91]

Malody might be uneasy listening but it's as brave as it is completely unexpected. [Jul 2016, p.90]

The 52-minute suite was mostly recorded live, as Ray vamps, beautifully as always, through shivery glades of country blues, girl-group drama and Link Wray throb: this time around, she dwells at the shadowy end of the street, with less room for levity. [Jul 2016, p.93]

Genders' decision to forsake his husky tones for a forthright falsetto immediately adds an unsettling nuance to Throws' twisting tales and burrowing melodies. [Jul 2016, p.93]

This is real chase-the-devil-out revival with Reed's cut-throat scream and bluesy guitar playing pinned to an anything-goes-in-the-name-of-the-spirit backbeat. [Jul 2016, p.90]

Producer Joe Henry complements Toussaint with respectful production and respected guests including Charles Lloyd, Van Dyke Parks and the thrilling trilling of Rhiannon Giddens. [Jul 2016, p.94]

So really, Let The Record Show is a game of two halves, a little jumbled up perhaps, but one in which Rowland ultimately triumphs. [Jun 2016, p.90]

For all its grace and subtlety, this is a vigorous, life-affirming record. [Jul 2016, p.90]

Here they are, refreshed and refocused if not exactly reinvented. [Jul 2016, p.90]

The results are highly accomplished and consistently gorgeous. [Jul 2016, p.92]

With Sing to the Moon, Laura Mvula set a new standard for 21st century soul. With this follow-up, she's raised that standard higher. [Jul 2016, p.89]

It's only when Lennon takes over that the collaboration really works. [Jul 2016, p.94]

Simon's new music sounds inventive, surprising and catchy to boot. [Jul 2016, p.94]

Pierced Arrow's 10 tracks range from strutting, power-chord anthems and barroom boogies to riff-driven shuffles. [Jun 2016, p.91]

Stitched together with a number of spoken word excerpts from the likes of neo-shaman Terence McKenna, it's music rooted in the early UK rave scene. [May 2016, p.91]

Its music whose provenance is the dance floor, but steeped in emotional warmth. [Jul 2016, p.95]

Garbage haven't released an album this immediate, melodically strong and thematically interesting since their self-titled 1995 debut. [Jul 2016, p.91]

Timeless fare presented with panache and enduring love. [Jul 2016, p.97]

It's a triumph for experimental chemistry: dramatic, deeply felt, dynamically designed. Minor Victories might've been put together at a distance, but it's all there. [Jul 2016, p.92]

Though Fry's take on affairs of the heart is more sedate, less conflicted than 1982's fraught quest for something authentic in a jungle of cheap representations, there are enough A1 tunes and ambitious lyrical conceits to satisfy fans of the original. [Jul 2016, p.95]

Smooth soul or hip hop tropes being largely the order of the day here. [Jul 2016, p.95]

The one-nature of the wracked, robotic torch songs does wear thin by closer Smoke Rings, however. [Jun 2016, p.95]

The influences--Shadow Morton, Nina Roti, '80s dream pop--are easily detectable, but intuitively utilised. [Jul 2016, p.96]

The main strength of this album is how the guitar playing, which is superb throughout, feels inextricably bound to the structure and shape of the melodies. [Jul 2016, p.95]

There's some fight in Hard Habit To Break's elastic boxing-ring bravado, or the ambiguous needling bleep of Doing It To Death, but behind the pair's rangy insouciance lies a hollowness that, this time round, doesn't entirely convince as a deliberate artistic position. [Jul 2016, p.92]

Amid all its big, primal energy there are enough ideas to suggest the fans' early faith is justified. [Jul 2016, p.94]

This set is more ambitious, sometimes bonkers [than his previous two albums]. [Jun 2016, p.91]

The Brooklyn foursome's debut is the work of some feverishly creative minds, as it effortlessly genre-hops between dusty Americana, Breeders-style angular art-pop and off-kilter folk. [Jun 2016, p.93]

The eight tracks on Rojus rise and fall like a club set. [Jul 2016, p.95]

Four decades and eight albums in, however, their own status as much cherished melody makers seems perfectly secure. [Jul 2016, p.93]

Their most accessible outing yet. [Jul 2016, p.91]

Blending bossa with trip-hop and samba with vintage synths, she creates an entirely contemporary blend. [Jul 2016, p.91]

At their best, the band conjures a delicious mix of slippery funk and soaring horns, a feelgood soundtrack to roaring down the freeway--or pootling to the off-licence. [Jul 2016, p.90]

Vision Fortune and then Spectres themselves serve up two slices of white noise, and even the hardiest listener may question the necessity of any further submissions. More substantial things arrive further on. [Jul 2016, p.93]

Stott again collaborates with opera singer Alison Skidmore on decaying digital laments, warped twilight anthems and claustrophobic club bangers; stuttering songs of mourning for 21st century club culture. [Jul 2016, p.93]

The Machine Stops proves that Dave Brock's sonic adventures still have plenty to say, and inspired ways in which to say it. [Jul 2016, p.95]

This album delivers rather less than the hoped-for thrilling mix of Latin rhythms, scorching organ and lyrical blues-mariachi guitar solos, but does so in bulk. [Jul 2016, p.96]

A more austere, exploratory affair. [Jul 2016, p.97]

[A] dark and glorious vision, reinterpreting Nashville country-soul hits from the '60s and '70s. [Jul 2016, p.97]

The better interpretations come from artists who embrace the Dead's improvisational essence. [Jul 2016, p.97]

All told, another luxurious wallow in art and agitation. [Jul 2016, p.98]

If Congrats is no less aggressive than its three predecessors, the crisp Neon Dad qualifies as pop and Acidic is a weird kind of joyous electronic ska. [Jun 2016, p.92]

What Dylan gives us in these recordings is something of a sentimental memoir.

Shauf paints an endearing sketch of his house party's many moods. [Jun 2016, p.97]

Another sprawling, somewhat overwrought Ashcroft solo record. [Jun 2016, p.88]

Toledo's ability to craft songs that swerve from fuzz-pop to jaded melancholia making him a cut above his underground contemporaries. [Jun 2016, p.92]

Clapton hasn't sounded quite so inspired in years. [Jun 2016, p.88]

The Wild Swan echoes both John Hiatt's gnarled, R&B-rooted wit and Van Morrison's lyrical-mystic flights while developing Vance's own romantic voice. [Jun 2016, p.90]

If David Lynch were looking to soundtrack dreamlike disassociation, he need look no further. [Jun 2016, p.91]

Altogether, a brilliant and very welcome return. [Jun 2016, p.88]

An account of how virulent idealogy can draw in the most rational people. [Jun 2016, p.97]

The Triad's twinkly elegance is packed with rich detail that greatly rewards deeper investigation. [Jun 2016, p.96]

Even if elsewhere the electronic elements occasionally err toward the passe, ultimately, this is as spirited as it is an unexpected cavort through altered sonic pastures. [Jun 2016, p.94]

While the production still feels ill-judged, there are some crackling tracks. [Jun 2016, p.92]

Tracks recorded with Cyndi Lauper and Primal Scream suggest some pruning might have made for a more impactful listening experience. [Jun 2016, p.88]

It began with 2013's minimalist Blindspot, harrowing on lost love; moved into 2014's Distance, trying to accept things; and here's reflection. [Jun 2016, p.94]

Fan The Flames and French African Queen end the CD with real vigour. Confirmed fans will lap it up. [Jun 2016, p.93]

Cohen's sometimes overly mannered, Brett Anderson-echoing vocals won't be for everyone, but nevertheless this is a brave and absorbing statement. [Jun 2016, p.91]

With its wealth of sonic adventure, its thoughtful merger of the personal and the political, and its four choice guest spots (Jack White; Kendrick Lamar; James Blake; Abel Makkonen Tesfaye AKA The Weeknd), Lemonade is a dazzling example of pooled talent coalescing around an iconic doyenne. There can be little doubt on whose head Prince’s crown should now sit.

A Splash Of Colour remains more grab-bag than coherent statement. [Jun 2016, p.104]

Their early temper now lurks beneath, as chiming post-punk atmos channels affecting, emotional jabs. [Jun 2016, p.97]

Each track on Under The Sun has its own unique, haunting spirit, lingering long after the final note decays. [Jun 2016, p.95]

She immediately impresses with a solid version of Wanda Jackson's Funnel Of Love, then moves on to deliver a brace of Patsy Cline classics that stand the comparison test, before with the aid of Vince Gill, whooping it up on You're The Reason Our Kids Are Ugly. [Jun 2016, p.94]

Too often their untethered jangle neglects the other side of the tight-but-loose equation. [Jun 2016, p.97]

Choral folk pop reveries and soft rock tease out the cosmic everyday. [Jun 2016, p.97]

Hopelessness sees Anohni take a harder radical line--her rich, red velvet voice set not in the pastoral piano landscapes of lauded past albums, but in the contemporary electronic stylings of two producers: Glasgow DJ Hundson Mohawke and his Warp label contemporary, Brooklyn's Daniel Lopatin aka Oneohtrix Point Never. [Jun 2016, p.89]