This darker edge lends substance to some of Vile's best songs to date. [Oct 2015, p.94]

This is not a record that wants or needs to be solved, but the clues and traces it leaves behind are so compelling it's difficult to let it alone. [Oct 2015, p.86]

Mind Over Matter's sleazy rockabilly nightmares and Captain Beefheart-channeling psychedelic detours are entirely keeping with the group's '80s records. [Jun 2015, p.93]

The winning formula could hold Chvrches back from breaking new ground. [Oct 2015, p.90]

The seven songs--mostly lengthy, one epic--have (as expected) extraordinary guitar solos, fused vocal harmonies, sprightly old-time and brooding folk. [Oct 2015, p.93]

A triumphant second solo chapter. [Oct 2015, p.98]

There is always the creamy centre of that angelic voice, making this a mightily impressive debut. [Oct 2015, p.93]

Rattle That Lock escapes the weight of legacy and operates in the here and now in a serene triumphant manner. [Oct 2015, p.88]

Phil's voice is fierce, Dave is warm and the band masterly. [Oct 2015, p.93]

Kwabs' effortless ability to glide through genres and attract ungrudging royal endorsements will, one suspects, give his moving debut serious legs. [Oct 2015, p.96]

Wright has unequivocally delivered her best album yet. [Oct 2015, p.94]

By turns whimsical, self-deprecating and humorous. [Oct 2015, p.93]

Such is the breadth of ideas and chutzpah here that you can even forgive Godin for having the temerity to name one track Bach Off. [Oct 2015, p.89]

Hollow Meadows carries his usual stamp of songwriting quality, but rather than further develop these new sonics and dynamics it feels more like a retrenchment. [Oct 2015, p.88]

A more nuanced approach than generally prevails on his records with The Hold Steady. [Oct 2015, p.90]

Jazz and trip-hop shade this darkness. [Oct 2015, p.96]

The thrill-packed Mudflowers--as unlikely as it seems--will be high on 2015's American best-of lists. [Sep 2015, p.88]

At times feeling almost uncomfortably personal, i the main these indie-folk confessionals are kept just the right side of maudlin to make Barlow's exposed emotional workings a surprisingly engaging listen. [Oct 2015, p.96]

Hauff gives you the feeling that there's something very wrong, and leaves you to make up your own nasty stories. [Oct 2015, p.96]

[A] gloriously sensual record. [Sep 2015, p.93]

Another epically conceived record from a cult hero who should be slaying arenas. [Oct 2015, p.95]

Despite two years spent on its dense construction, Music Complete rarely feels stilted, though it could use a stricter edit.... Yet the compensatory highs go beyond expectations. [Oct 2015, p.89]

The guitarist has made the best and most honest of his outside raids, freshening his classicism with a hard stare at payback and mortality. [Oct 2015, p.91]

There are several instant classics here. [Oct 2015, p.94]

By and large, as per its title, Yours, Dreamily is a downtempo treat, tailor-made for sundazed summer evening drives with the window down. [Sep 2015, p.87]

Doomed to the shadows of Flying Nun's more famed exponents, this box set should finally rehabilitate the band. [Sep 2015, p.103]

This time nuance embellishments lend greater power and depth. [Oct 2015, p.90]

There's a synergy and rapport in the set's dozen tracks that reveals how deeply the new band has gelled with Mayall. [Oct 2015, p.88]

No nonsense also means no frills and Stereophonics still follow the white line straight down the middle, doggedly relying on songs rather than production dazzle or image to see them through. [Oct 2015, p.96]

Esteemed Cologne unit corrals a trans-global selection of the dancefloor's most revered. [Sep 2015, p.95]

All lovely throwbacks have an instant familiarity. [Oct 2015, p.93]

Affecting, uplifting, damned catchy. [Oct 2015, p.94]

While Riddick doesn't boast the vocal chops of his heroes, telling interventions from Q-Tip, Leon Sylvers III and The Doggfather himself flesh out his questing intergalactic creations with charm to spare. [Oct 2015, p.89]

Their mellowest ever high. [Oct 2015, p.92]

This fourth album takes then back to the headlong kitchen-sink pop of their excellent 2009 debut Jewellery. [Oct 2015, p.95]

Low have made one of the most impressive albums of their career and it still feels like their best work is ahead of them rather than stuck back in the past. [Oct 2015, p.92]

A solid collection of angst anthems. [Oct 2015, p.98]

Few recent debuts have felt quite so enjoyable. [Sep 2015, p.94]

Paper Gods feels like a Duran Duran-shaped helium balloon, impressive, shiny, but oddly empty inside. [Oct 2015, p.96]

This is easily Battles' best album to date, the one you've always hoped they would make. [Oct 2015, p.95]

A record of disarming directness. [Oct 2015, p.89]

With a playing time of just 29 minutes, this feels more like a holding exercise than a fully-fledged long-playing statement. [Oct 2015, p.88]

They may occasionally press autopilot but the unexpected sound of Blythe singing for the first time ever on Overlord proves their willingness to suppress a few decibels for the sake of progress. It suits them. [Oct 2015, p.90]

This largely autobiographical follow-up uses Guy's musician friends more wisely. [Oct 2015, p.91]

The whole album unfolds at a pace somewhere between stately and glacial. [Oct 2015, p.93]

Some structural confusion aside, it's easy to embrace his Johnny-Flynn-does-indie songs. [Oct 2015, p.98]

10 well-crafted, progressive rock tracks that transcend schlock-rock trappings. [Oct 2015, p.98]

By opening out his vocals slightly from the gruff mutter of yore, Ashworth has extended his music's emotional range to that of a battery-powered Kris Kristofferson. [Sep 2015, p.94]

Foals consolidate their position here by continuing to do what they do best, namely expressing big emotions loudly through fizzing rock anger or unbridled, danceable joy.

This small brick of a box set housing 22 Isley Brothers albums, many of them essential to any soul-funk library, astonishingly does not include something like a dozen tracks that any sane person would suggest were key to the band's story. This is not a complaint, merely a fact to illustrate the broad sweep of their career. [Sep 2015, p.104]

While other Clansmen excel are building intricate metaphors and vivid storytelling, Method Man is all about swaggering confidence and masterflow flows. [Sep 2015, p.93]

Lyrically, beating the odds and ultra-violence remain fecund topics for Lemmy. [Sep 2015, p.86]

The Cardiff-LA pairing might be creatively equal, but the sound they make is beautifully out of balance. [Sep 2015, p.93]

This is restrained music-making; a slow-release capsule of languid grooves, haunting vocals and crafted songwriting. [Sep 2015, p.93]

Channelling prog ambition, punk attack and all the daring of Krautrock, Pere Ubu were extraordinary. [Sep 2015, p.103]

While the boisterousness that made 2006 single Chelsea Dagger so welcome on the terraces of Stamford Bridge is successfully repurposed on Baby Don't You Lie To Me! and Too Much Wine, and Thief motors like Lady Madonna on Stevie's Higher Ground, other fruits of this reunion with producer Tony Hoffer--see the mellotron-mangled Rosanna--soon sour. [Sep 2015, p.94]

A vessel for unsettled emotional truths. [Sep 2015, p.95]

There's very little talking and the music is powerful and gentle, thoughtful and utterly riveting. [Sep 2015, p.101]

Songs filled with rustic, caught-between-light-and-dark country metaphors. [Sep 2015, p.95]

The songs remain brilliantly elliptical surveys, often of contemporary America. [Sep 2015, p.103]

Hidden Fields finds Lawrie drifting back to his black-denim roots with five tracks of distortion heavy, song-based sedation.[Sep 2015, p.92]

The techno seedlings that before poked through the soil sporadically now burst into full bloom. [Sep 2015, p.93]

Like Lamar’s grandstanding To Pimp A Butterfly, the numerous strands of Compton: A Soundtrack take time and effort to fully unravel, but the rewards are manifold.

The concept is a bit arch and it's easy to get overly trainspotterish with this kind of venture.... apart frim some obviously recognisable moments it sounded like a quality Yo La Tengo album. [Sep 2015, p.88]

They can't always resist their old ways, as autumn processional PPP shows, but Legrand's vocals feel sweeter and closer. [Sep 2015, p.87]

There's nothing bland about this fervid, ideasy album. [Sep 2015, p.90]

Though the results are not always easy to take.... The sense of folk and country pervades each and every performance, saving the day. [Sep 2015, p.90]

Golden Ticket is a diverse treat. [Sep 2015, p.93]

More spacious acoustic currents entwine to create softer, calming reveries every bit as difficult to resist. [Jul 2015, p.90]

Baobab fans will love this, though the Massako tracks have audible distortion. [Sep 2015, p.101]

Their anarchic spirit is captured over the original LP's 11 tracks. [Sep 2015, p.92]

Maker's vocal may be Thom Yorke-like, falsetto lift0-invcluded, but that equidistant spellbound bittersweet spot is Aero Flynn's outright. [Sep 2015, p.91]

It's all muted lust and seductive Scandi sophistication. [Sep 2015, p.92]

Songs and melody remain paramount in this irresistible Technicolor world. [Sep 2015, p.88]

Occasionally there is so much going on it's dizzying--haunting, vulnerable You is a welcome break. [Sep 2015, p.92]

The glitchy electronics hard shield his soulful voice, but on tracks like Corner the digital pulse yields more human warmth. [Sep 2015, p.95]

At once spooky and playful, romantic and angry. [Sep 2015, p.89]

Presence is the best of the three [remasters].... The deluxe edition's bonus track, a soft, piano-led instrumental titled Pod, reiterates how dark and gnarly the rest is. [Sep 2015, p.98]

In Through The Out Door is an honest album that makes Zeppelin sound (almost) human. But it hasn't aged well. [Sep 2015, p.98]

The best of the original bunch is still the frantic rockabilly charge Wearing And Tearing from the Polar Studio sessions.... What gives this new Coda its edge are versions of Four Sticks and Friends recorded in 1972 by Page and Plant in Bombay with local musicians who'd never heard a Led Zeppelin song before. [Sep 2015, p.98]

Evocative songs of Cornish coastal contemplation. [Sep 2015, p.95]

What Turner lacks in lyrical bravura he makes up with arena sized melodic hooks. [Sep 2015, p.95]

This is an album that seduces as readily as it challenges. [Sep 2015, p.88]

Abyss is a darkly compelling tour de force. [Sep 2015, p.94]

Impressive--and then some. [Sep 2015, p.86]

Bowness's delivery on the more subdued material tends to revisit similar melodic cadences, but when the musicians inject more energy, as on The Great Electric Teenage Dream and the gorgeous Sing To Me, the music is transported to a different level. [Sep 2015, p.90]

Surely the sweetly sour bubblegum album of 2015. [Sep 2015, p.86]

Furthering their Sonic Youth/Television post-punk quests. [Sep 2015, p.95]

An epic, cataclysmic set playing host to moments of magnificent Strum-und-Drang. [Sep 2015, p.92]

At 70 minutes long, there's a lot to digest but it's worth persevering with as repeated listens gradually unveil a musical universe unlike any other. [Sep 2015, p.89]

The overall sense is of a spirited and inventive band truly coming into their own. [Sep 2015, p.87]

The hits may well keep rolling in for Years & Years, but next time a bit more adventure wouldn't go amiss. [Sep 2015, p.87]

A leaner, more radio-friendly effort. [Sep 2015, p.86]

The devil's in the details, be it the drum machine patterns that propel Church or the lush pedal-augmented textures of Medieval, while the instrumentals that open and close the album aren't simple throwaways but highlights. [Sep 2015, p.86]

Spry and spontaneous sounding. [Sep 2015, p.87]

The surface of Another One is pure pleasure; underneath, it's not quite so easy. [Sep 2015, p.90]

Blood proves to be another mixed bag. [Aug 2015, p.92]

Star Wars confirms that Wilco now fully own a unique American noise wherein nothing is wholly traditional or wholly experimental. But if the band’s own sense of self is stalwart, the characters they detail are consistently unmoored.