Baroness have delivered their masterpiece: an album grounding their cosmic heaviosity with earthbound, compelling drama. [Jan 2016, p.88]

Right On! seesaws between spectral moments of introspection and bristling passages of electric activity. [Jan 2016, p.88]

Halfway through and it's breathtakingly apparent that David Bowie isn't so much back on the horse as riding bareback towards a cliff-edge. [Jan 2016, p.86]

Sunn O))) devotees will find satisfaction, but newcomers should start with 2009’s igneous rock classic Monoliths & Dimensions.

This second outing is an exercise in documenting a much beefier, hot-blooded sound. [Nov 2015, p.87]

Never one for youthful giddiness, her third album is strikingly authoritative, tending towards the imperious even when expressing vulnerability yet rarely coming over as soullessly efficient.

With a voice now dry and shaky, Friedman nonetheless revels in his novelist knack for tall tales. [Dec 2015, p.86]

At their most affecting and cohesive to date. [Dec 2015, p.91]

The Miraculous is complex and provocative. [Dec 2015, p.87]

An album drenched in familiar swathes of charm, pathos, elegance and black humour. [Dec 2015, p.90]

It's over-reliance on Nine Inch Nails atmospherics and Boots's far from distinctive Bowie-lite croon could benefit from further tweaking. [Dec 2015, p.92]

This is Lopatin's most cogent record yet. [Dec 2015, p.91]

These transformations prove entirely worthwhile. [Dec 2015, p.92]

Only two original members remain--David Thomas, also of Pere Ubu, and bass guitarist Craig Bell--and their approach feels oddly inconsistent. [Dec 2015, p.90]

Younghusband's second LP pushes bittersweet melodies from under a reverb rug. [Dec 2015, p.94]

Mehldau is never bereft of imagination, using his source material as a vehicle for sublime musical storytelling that results in some of the most beautiful piano playing you'll ever hear. [Dec 2015, p.87]

The LA quintet still sound like 16-year-old boys.... Musically, though, their slick soulful pop-R&B is far more refined. [Dec 2015, p.94]

West Kirby Country Primary declares the vivid flowering of a great talent. [Dec 2015, p.84]

Atmos aplenty then, but more melodies like Magdalene's would be nice. [Dec 2015, p.94]

Unreconstructed rock thrills (produced by Jeff Lyne). [Nov 2015, p.96]

[A] perfect symbiosis of mournful brass and life-giving rock. [Dec 2015, p.92]

His self-titled debut falls a little short, but Son Little has potential. [Dec 2015, p.89]

Jones sounds like he's in his element. [Nov 2015, p.94]

[An] extraordinary beautiful debut. [Dec 2015, p.87]

This is Joe Ely at his rugged best. [Nov 2015, p.94]

The recurring hallmark is Ritter's literate storytelling. [Nov 2015, p.94]

Hi Honey ultimately triumphs thanks to its creator' perfect chemistry. [Aug 2015, p.93]

The injection of vintage jewels that worked so well in-concert doesn't necessarily make for a coherent listen here. [Dec 2015, p.90]

There can't have been a better 1968 record in all of 2015. [Dec 2015, p.90]

The definitive elements of this bijou gem are the author's own. [Dec 2015, p.86]

Another weighty addition to this first-choice list. [Dec 2015, p.91]

Cheatah's emotional core is easily decipherable. [Dec 2015, p.94]

Gibbons's wily blend of open-mindedness and roots-loyalty remains intact. [Nov 2015, p.86]

Mashup of overused modern dancefloor styles and rote bragging, with odd moment of classic purple peculiarity. [Dec 2015, p.94]

[Illuminates] Nash's own cosmic poetry, crunching guitars and swooning pedal steel. [Dec 2015, p.94]

They draw from a practiced old hand's bag of tricks yet feel delightfully fresh. [Dec 2015, p.93]

Suffice to say, they've kept their edge. [Dec 2015, p.93]

The overriding tone recalls Lana Del Rey's gothic torch song elegies, albeit with far more economy and less overacting. [Dec 2015, p.93]

Henley's discourses on ageing and feeling adrift in the modern world are poignant, and, on A Younger Man, painfully well observed. [Dec 2015, p.93]

It's great credit to both Lund and his versatile backing bad, The Hurtin' Albertans, that such see-sawing through genres can sound so much like a singular piece of work. [Dec 2015, p.93]

This latest doesn't noticeably monkey with their formula, and with good reason. [Dec 2015, p.93]

Louis Carnell crafts grime's own I Hear A New World. [Dec 2015, p.91]

A tad more conventional than Liz Harris's ongoing work as Grouper, despite roots in C86 shambling and early-90s shoegaze, Helen's hazy, half-grasped songs are still several left turns from any standard indie fare. [Dec 2015, p.86]

For Gahan, Angels & Ghosts is another opportunity to repeat his therapeutic cycle of guilt-shedding and redemption. [Dec 2015, p.88]

Return To The Noon can seem too dense a construct to penetrate. [Dec 2015, p.88]

Stewart still has the voice and, on the gravelly rocker Please and the Steve Harley/Jim Cregan co-write A Friend For Life, the songs. But the rest is best avoided. [Dec 2015, p.86]

With his amiable croak and humour warming his observations, Manhattan is no bitter mope. [Dec 2015, p.90]

Simplicity rules throughout and the material doesn't stray far from folk roots, yet always sounds contemporary. [Dec 2015, p.92]

Although the second half of the album doesn't quite match up to the front, there's no sense it's dragging, either. [Dec 2015, p.88]

Garvey's poetics have acquired more acuity. [Dec 2015, p.86]

The awkward early passages of Pyramid/When The Poor Can reach The Moon would surely struggle to gain airplay in any decade, including this one, yet it ultimately rises to the kind of triumphant chorus at which Phillipps excels. [Nov 2015, p.87]

Martin Courtney's music is unsurprisingly like Real Estate's in that it comes at an unhurried tempo and sounds deceptively simple. [Nov 2015, p.94]

A mightily approachable and sometimes even fun album. [Nov 2015, p.88]

[A] soaring yet engagingly earthly first album. [Nov 2015, p.96]

Half Moon Run may still be exploring a road that travels between Django Django's left-field indie pop and the wintry harmonies of Fleet Foxes, but the scenery is damned fine. [Nov 2015, p.89]

A fittingly weighty document of their emotional heft. [Nov 2015, p.105]

All in all, this is an unqualified triumph. [Nov 2015, p.86]

It's when everything begins to fan out like a peacock's tail at the height of courting season that you're reminded just why Newsom is a 21st century one-off. [Nov 2015, p.84]

By the end, As If makes you want to run away, arm in arm with the night. [Nov 2015, p.93]

Evan Brettin's sometimes self-conscious production affectations cannot obscure a thoroughly lovely psych-pop album. [Nov 2015, p.88]

For Use And Delight is by turns plaintive and rocking, a wistful rhythmic journey into a band's true beating heart. [Nov 2015, p.90]

At its best--Northern Blues' soulful echo--a bit of Southern grit's rubbed off on the Canadian. [Nov 2015, p.96]

Whatever the style, Rod Argent and Colin Blunstone’s music is executed with wholehearted passion and technical precision.

The second CD's half-hour of demos and discards is a repeat-play joy. [Nov 2015, p.102]

The County Durham punks' first in 36 years is suitably grown-up if a little underwhelming. [Nov 2015, p.96]

They ensure Deerhunter's most accessible songs yet are also their most affecting. [Nov 2015, p.86]

The Making Of is a decent debut. [Nov 2015, p.87]

Handsomely subversive. [Nov 2015, p.89]

This fuzzy psych soul suffers from too many Stones riffs, not enough fresh ideas. [Nov 2015, p.96]

[A] mix of old themes and new forms. [Nov 2015, p.96]

Fish is Chapman still pushing out the boat and long may he sail. [Nov 2015, p.86]

Defiantly dark, dense and hazy hip hop and paranoid urban blues. [Nov 2015, p.93]

Overall, Beck's playing is by turns exquisitely dainty and jaw-droppingly unhinged. [Jul 2015, p.86]

Beach Music is stylistically disjointed. [Nov 2015, p.94]

Taken as a rollercoaster whole, this will blow any right-thinking rock-action believer's head off. [Nov 2015, p.87]

The twinkling, chaotic, looped intensity of All Graphs Explored is typical of Larry Gus's individual and highly charismatic approach. [Nov 2015, p.89]

An intriguing blend of countrified, down-tempo acoustic charm. [Nov 2015, p.96]

Although perhaps too much arrangement is thrown at the producer-penned opener Among The Believers, second track Forbidden Nights, written in 2009 by Elvis Costello, has a stronger melody. [Nov 2015, p.92]

Ought's sound is stamped with enough original invention for them to stand tall amongst the art-schooled crowd. [Nov 2015, p.90]

Dodge And Burn is at the very least a solid offering with some dramatic and exhilarating rock'n'roll moments, but overall it's more a consolidation than a staking out of new ground. [Nov 2015, p.87]

The skinny is it's more reminiscent of Led Zeppelin III and late-period Black Crowes. [Nov 2015, p.86]

[A] flawed but magnificent album. [Nov 2015, p.88]

Girl Band play ugly noise with a charisma and energy to drag them from the no wave ghetto, to somewhere bigger. [Nov 2015, p.89]

The bulk of In Dream is much darker, but no less alluring. [Nov 2015, p.94]

While the peppier River Of Longing and Palace Of Love are rousing, it's when the brakes are applied that Illegals in Heaven leaves a durable residue. [Nov 2015, p.90]

The gorgeous harmonies of Fran Foote add further engagement on a set rich in attitude and uncompromising intent. [Nov 2015, p.91]

Their big sound has a wide sonic palette, from the spacey keyboards of Honeytrap to the baroque strings and synths of Sunny, but there are some less inspired moments. [Oct 2015, p.91]

More diverse, howling dirges from the West Coast quartet. [Oct 2015, p.98]

Wistful alt pop gets an ample glug of electro groove and distinct hints of '80s cheese comfortably reinforce Austin William's hazy vocals. [Oct 2015, p.98]

McKeown adopts a sophisticated take on 4/4 grooves: with Calumet's stuttering organic rhythms offering a confident and captivating example. [Sep 2015, p.93]

Her ideas and unabashed sexual allusions, certainly, are a good deal more interesting than her inflexible retro-electro rumble. [Oct 2015, p.92]

Not all [are] successful, but the extent of her ambition cannot be faulted. [Oct 2015, p.90]

A serious trip. [Oct 2015, p.95]

From here, Del Rey will surely be forced to redraw the blueprint, but for now, this is her best yet.

Wald is a continued move in more playful directions. [Oct 2015, p.95]

Caracal is nothing less than one of the best pop albums of the year. [Oct 2015, p.90]

This is serious... and seriously good. [Oct 2015, p.89]

You don't dip into this music--it fully engulfs you. [Oct 2015, p.95]