Pure Comedy is quite some trip and one that lifts Father John Misty to another level altogether. [May 2017, p.93]

Sparer but equally powerful record [to U.F.O.F.]. [Nov 2019, p.90]

It's packed tight with wayward ideas. [Jul 2021, p.89]

It is Newsom's voice that provides the stunning balm to bind this strange beauty together. [Dec 2006, p.118]

A debut album of psychedelic gospel-tinged gems. [Mar 2013, p.94]

Full of understated elegance, Ode reminds us that Mehldau's is an increasingly significant body of work. [May 2012, p.82]

Heavyweight and sodden like the starry mills of Satan. [May 2012, p. 103]

Derretirse displays a consistent fondness for gauzy shimmer and hypnagogic atmospherics. [Aug 2019, p.93]

It's another sonically sumptuous milestone for the Northern Irish composer/producer. [May 2021, p.87]

It's the melodic strength of its 15 "proper" songs that's the real mindblower. [May 2021, p.81]

It's bracing, intense stuff, though the bleak wit that runs through Morris's proclamations and Dimitri Coats' brawny riffage ensures the earache is addictive. [Dec 2022, p.90]

There’s only one moment when the production distracts from the players, a brief yet clunky guitar overdub on Arajghiyine. Listeners who love a wide soundstage, however, with well-separated guitars coming at you from all angles, will be in heaven. Thankfully, the guests shun the spotlight, leaving Ibrahim, Alhassane Ag Touhami and Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni to concentrate on that elusive sound, the guitars cleaner and crisper than those that introduced Tinariwen to the world 20 years ago. [Jun 2023, p.82]

It possesses a charm and innocence that's genuinely disarming. [Oct 2023, p.88]

The fistful of Memento Mori tracks - especially the slow building Speak To Me - confirm what a strong, brooding album it was, but they're rattled off early in the set, leaving a glorious cavalcade of (mostly) hits for the second half. [Feb 2026, p.81]

Dacus finds the pages of her diary she just can't shake, turning them into songs that are destined to stay with you, too. [Jul 2021, p.78]

It's heavy stuff, but reliably gorgeous musically. [Nov 2022, p.82]

Truly, a glorious noise. [Nov 2003, p.128]

The idiosyncrasies of her voice are showcased to full effect in soul showstopper Call Me A Fool, with dramatic rasping and swooping that some might find off-putting, but which undeniably underlines her distinctive character. There's a delicacy too. [Apr 2021, p.80]

Gave In Rest is melancholy yet beautiful, slow spectral low-end devotional music: creating a complete world that calls for total immersion. [Nov 2018, p.91]

This is a mellifluous and hook-laden, brimming with Russell's quotidian snapshot lyrics. [Jan 2020, p.99]

Much warmer and more inviting [than 2017's Pleasure]. [May 2023, p.88]

It's also the group's most exciting, most engaged, most breathtaking album this century. [Mar 2023, p.85]

It's vintage Boards Of Canada--a beautiful, shimmering, electronic maelstrom of liquid, vintage synths and slo-mo beats. [Jul 2013, p.82]

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

While keyboardist Vijay Iyer and bassist/Moog player Shahzad Ismaily summon a succession of iridescent, jazz-ambient drones and stimulating pianistic inventions, the compelling centre here is always Aftab's extraordinary voice, a thing of languorously modulating beauty. [May 2023, p.84]

Sundown is both a bigger sounding LP than Pleasure, Joy And Happiness but also a deeper one. [May 2023, p.91]

Strange Mercy is the shimmering, expansive sound of an artist defiantly coming into her own. [Oct 2011, p.104]

Hulking beats and a cloudy, black electronic roar set the tone, but powerful sound design is the key. [Feb 2020, p.91]

Holy grail or curate’s egg, diehard fans will run to this 5-disc package and relish even its flaws. Adding the original album simply emphasises what we already knew: Nebraska represents the very best of Bruce Springsteen. [Dec 2025, p.92]

Well-crafted third from the south London art pop duo with a playful spirit to match their impeccable post-punk influences. [Jul 2018, p.98]

While the nebulous quality of Mercy was very much feature-not-bug, a cloudiness indicating the limits of memory, here Cale seems to have sharpened the edges of his songs, any mist or drift purely down to old fashioned meandering. [Jul 2024, p.86]

One Beat is not an album you slip into. You pick it up, study it, twist it, put it down, pick it up again. [Sep 2002, p.108]

Sparely and intuitively performed, it's simply excellent. [Aug. 2011, p. 94]

It's Bronxie's heart, soul and natural world-inspired epiphanies that charm most. [May 2015, p.96]

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

Chorus probes that the light from Lush's star still shines brighter and stronger than anyone might have suspected. [Jan 2016, p.105]

The sounds of surrounding life collaborating with art. [Jun 2017, p.86]

So rich is their vocabulary of subtly shifting textures ad discreet melodies that lazy ambient cliche or factory setting keyboard predictability are entirely eschewed. [Jul 2017, p.92]

The cast of Beautiful fits with unforeseen subtlety. [Nov 2017, p.103]

R.E.M. At The BBC is not definitive history, but as a corrective to the idea that the post-Monster years were just R.E.M.'s long sweep into elder statesmanhood, it presents a fine alternative one. [Dec 2018, p.101]

Flaming Pie saw Paul McCartney critically asserting his place in the Fabbed-up mid-90s landscape. [Sep 2020, p.102]

An epic ride. [Oct 2020, p.87]

The Sunday Valley songs survive the transition best, particularly All The Pretty Colours, but the psychonaut jiber-jabber from 2014's Metamodern Sounds In Country Music album comes a strong second. [Jan 2021, p.86]

I Don't Live Here Anymore is the most grounded War On Drugs record and the best: a calm space amid a world in collapse. [Nov 2021, p.82]

An exquisite collection of R&B message songs that have subtly been reframed with a jazz twist to reflect dystopian developments in contemporary American life. [May 2023, p.84]

A culturally rich and generally wonderful 72 minutes of little-heard revelry. [Oct 2024, p.94]

American indie cult heroes get a little noisier, a little more obscure [June 2010, p. 104]

Yanya's music calls to mind gritty jazz/rock griot King Krule, Sampha's contemplative street soul and her key teenage influences: Pixies, Winehouse and The Libertines. Her spiky guitar playing is confidently pushed to the front of the mix here. [Apr 2019, p.86]

So beautiful Or So What is a deeply spiritual record, its more reflective moments offset by playful fare. [may 2011, p.106]

Rich and radio-friendly pop. [Apr 2012, p.101]

It's this continued need to feed her multi-platinum beast that stops the album from being the post-modern wheeze it could have been. [Mar 2014, p.94]

A glorious melange of love, loss, regret, homesickness and romance. [Sep 2005, p.86]

These songs have an impressive vehemency, whether showcasing uncanny AI balladry on Soul With Me, industrial wall-of-sound on Speak To Me and People Are Good, electro-pop dissociation on My Favourite Stranger, or hydraulically pumped Brel-drama on Don't Say You Love Me. [May 2023, p.85]

An oddly seamless follow-up to its distant predecessor. [Nov 2005, p.110]

These songs have a sharp, glittery edge, like a neat tequila slammer. [Apr 2019, p.92]

Sol. Hz radiates a luxuriant warmth that's hinted in its title. [Jun 2026, p.93]

Though the production is by no means slick, the music emerges vividly from its hithero murky world. [Jul 2010, p.93]

A profoundly sad and affecting collage of memory and longing, ghostly torch songs half-buried in the claustrophobic electronic clatter of the modern world. [May 2019, p.95]

Lets playfulness weave through her cinematic forms, as orchestral tapestries, chamber folk and electronics commune. [Dec 2020, p.89]

All told: here's blues, raw'n'alive. [Sep 2023, p.83]

Bauhaus Staircase shows OMD thriving as much as surviving. [Dec 2023, p.91]

Marries Gerald Clayton's vivid, painterly piano with Immanuel Wilkins' malleable alto sax and vibraphonist Joel Ross's heady melodicism, its internal poetry enhanced by Kendrick Scott's sophisticated drums and Matt Brewer's intricate bass. [Jan 2025, p.85]

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

After 1991's low impact Kill Uncle, the often truculent Your Arsenal was where Morrissey discovered a newly villainous persona and a way forward. [Mar 2014, p.105]

A ghosts' convention set to music. [Nov 2003, p.130]

Last Broadcast is visceral, pulsing, uplifting, widescreen but has none of the bluster that would tip its forbears into self-parody. [May 2002, p.108]

This record is full of surprises, roping in all manner of esoteria for a sweaty, beer-splattered and tune-drenched rock'n'roll party that rivals even Nevermind for balancing the pop sugar with the twisted underbelly and subtle smarts. [May 2003, p.90]

Cursive employ musical inventiveness and a healthy dose of self-awareness to set themselves apart. [Apr 2003, p.102]

Ocean Roar exists deep in extreme nature, a journey's end of madness, memory and Euphoria. [Nov 2012, p.95]

With these elegantly devastating songs, she carves put a space, and a class, all of her own. [Mar 2019, p.91]

Beautifully poised. [Dec 2021, p.92]

With its major keys, funky breakbeats, scorching guitar solos and soothing flutes, here's one Gizzard Magnum opus not to miss in the deluge. [Dec 2022, p.92]

From rowdy juke-joint jams to sunblushed cornfield ballads, these songs born of tough times. The latter provides the album's stand-out moments. [Jul 2009, p.100]

She's taken a great leap forward at the very moment one was required. [Jul 2022, p.89]

The album gels and is unexpectedly airy: with its souffle-light facade and full-fat core, this is a delight. [Dec 2025, p.83]

A compelling consistency of mood makes Metal Illness easy to get lost in. [May 2017, p.94]

These songs of faith and endurance work because the singer/guitarist and his band play according to their album's title--with hearts of oak, which refers not to flesh turned stiff, but to spirits that are stout, strong, tall. [Apr 2003, p.112]

Portrait gives us what the composer feels are the definitive versions of these tracks. It's also an excellent introduction to this most singular of musicians. [Jan 2020, p.88]

Arranged with exquisite care, not a swooning backing vocal, Gram Parsons echo or Brian Eeno-influenced synthesizer out of place. [Apr 2020, p.89]

The musicianship's great, Lloyd Maines' production's gorgeous and there's a slew of highlights. [Aug 2021, p.87]

Yellow scatterguns through P-Funk, Alice Coltrane, gospel, Sun-Ra, electric-era Miles Davis and '70s jazz-fusion with glee. [Aug 2021, p.85]

O'Neill has locked into humanity's flawed relationship with nature. But there's celebration too. [Mar 2023, p.92]

There's less reverb this time, but it all sounds great, befitting a set of excellent songs. [May 2025, p.85]

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

Forgotten outfits like The Romans and Mod Fun come on like the '60s band Thomas Pynchon invented in The Crying Of Lot 49, but the prevailing geekdom suggests a scene that's ultimately as indie and introverted as our own C86. [Apr 2026, p.98]

Delirious, danceable songs with emotional heft. [Dec 2022, p.89]

Tirzah matches the spacious, hazy intimacy of Levi's often distorted creations with unself-conscious melodies, as if singing in her sleep, finding beauty in imperfection and transience. [Nov 2023, p.90]

It's darker and more complex than their debut, but also bigger-sounding. [Sep 2020, p.80]

Their initial torrid confluence of My Bloody Valentine and Joy Division here shapeshifts more towards "synth-assisted stadium nu-gaze," with odd Kraut-y hints of early Simple Minds, and frequent echoes of their new found patron: fune-real The Arbor is pure Disintegration, while shimmering Keep It All To Yourself has Kiss Me! Kiss Me! Kiss Me!'s hi-tech dazzle. [Feb 2019, p.88]

It can be vague on the details, but Baker's songwriting is smart and serious enough to keep Little Oblivions from burning out entirely. [Apr 2021, p.86]

A charming glide of warm fuzz-pop that suffers only through their influences being worn perhaps too clearly upon their sleeves. [Oct 2004, p.101]

Fantasy Empire buzzes, drills and throbs with a brutal power that is relentlessly, terrifyingly exciting. [Apr 2015, p.89]

Raw and skiffly as you'd expect. [Apr 2015, p.95]

Beneath Tweedy's twinkling lights, Crowell wears each look like a favourite old coat - familiar, easy, and pocked by stains and rips that remind him of all he's seen. [Jun 2023, p.91]

Foxes In The Snow – a shoo-in for Isbell’s seventh Grammy – has already set the bar for best Americana album of the year. [Apr 2025, p.84]

Rarely less than poignant, with the composer's gift for aching earworm melody much in evidence. [Oct 2020, p.93]

Milk For Flowers sound wide awake; gloriously alive. [Apr 2023, p.89]

It's Stigmergy, named after a concept of collective action, that best encapsulates the ecstatic NIS groupthink: one hypnotic soloist after another - Ben Lamar Gay, brilliant on coronet - drifting elegantly in and out of systems repetition. [Jun 2023, p.92]