Gorgeously sweaty in its simplicity. [May 2005, p.103]

Not their masterpiece, but a sizeable effort nonetheless. [Apr 2006, p.100]

[It] is largely unfettered by the dictates of genre. [Jul 2006, p.106]

As a rough cut solo exercise, Rhys has delivered a blinder. [Feb 2005, p.102]

Some of it is tough and unforgiving... and some is pure pop plastique. [Apr 2005, p.89]

Smelts the classic rock canon (Madness, Blur, Bowie, Small Faces) into an infectious, head-spinning punch. [May 2005, p.109]

Breathtaking moments, brilliant tunes, and Breakdown, a genuinely Beatles-league pop hit. [Nov 2004, p.114]

Brings a little focus--and some memorable tunes--to the proceedings, though Wolf's muse remains doggedly eclectic. [May 2005, p.108]

Green sounds in his element. [Apr 2005, p.100]

Reveals another eclectic, kaleidoscopic world. [May 2005, p.106]

[An] almost equal measure of intriguing and tiresome music. [Jun 2005, p.108]

This is their best album in 65 years. [May 2005, p.94]

Retains the gum-tingling pop harmonies and guitar-throttling riffs of previous albums, but their reedy punk sinew has swollen into rock muscle. [Jun 2004, p.112]

Takes the most accessible aspects of the house-soaked, pre-Britpop scene and crafts a swaggering debut that places songwriting suss firmly above pointless posturing. [Oct 2004, p.97]

An agreeably bittersweet album. [Mar 2005, p.101]

Her textured roar means even the less melodic songs have traction. [May 2005, p.103]

Its claustrophobia is total, unique, spellbinding. [Mar 2005, p.106]

It's a little hard to take in one sitting, though downcast fans of Saint Etienne and The Magnetic Fields will find much to adore. [Sep 2005, p.92]

Sadly, the songs are less noticeable than the urge to strangle the drummer. [Mar 2005, p.101]

Listen to Frances The Mute without any prog-induced prejudice... and it emerges as the triumphant sound of a band bound only by their imagination. [Apr 2005, p.86]

It finds the group's estimable strengths consolidated as never before. [Jun 2005, p.112]

A rare feat: gentle and kind without becoming soppy or daft. [May 2005, p.109]

For all the band's rich resonance, she shines brightest when [producer Colin] Cripps holds the kilowatts. [May 2005, p.98]

A preposterous, highly-entertaining return. [Apr 2005, p.104]

I know which post-millennial album I'll add to the Atlantic, Bell and gospel classics. [Apr 2005, p.96]

There are a few weak links... but there's a melodic buoyancy here. [Mar 2005, p.106]

There's a freshness uncommon to fortysomething men two decades into their career. [Oct 2004, p.110]

An unexpectedly weird bolt from the blue, an ultimately outstanding crack at brokering an accord between spiky noo wave and fuzzy '70s stoner rock. [Nov 2004, p.116]

A rarefied exemplar of genteel bliss. [May 2005, p.108]

She keeps the mood focused and the music softly funky. [Mar 2005, p.92]

Transistor Radio's songs do lack the shirtfront-clenching grip of Ward's Transfiguration of Vincent set. But shapeless and misty atmospherics have their shadowy power too. [Mar 2005, p.92]

[A] queasy mix of super-sharp realism, clammy surrealism and elegant melody. [Feb 2005, p.98]

Barzelay's eye for quirky detail and ear for delicious melody keeps a nice balance to things. [Jun 2005, p.105]

A veritable treasure trove of electro-bubblegum, irresistible punk-funk, and hypnotic noise experiments. [Mar 2005, p.116]

It's a soundtrack for rainswept, sodium-lit backstreets. [Feb 2005, p.101]

It intrigues more than satisfies. [Apr 2005, p.100]

It's a few tracks too long, but it's easy to get lost in its smoked-out haze. [Apr 2005, p.89]

Makes for some striking textures. [Apr 2005, p.97]

Many of these sessions trump the original album versions. [Mar 2005, p.100]

Scales new heights of bong-loaded majesty. [May 2005, p.108]

Looting a Smithsy guitar line for Winter In The Hamptons or aping Steve McQueen-era Prefab Sprout on My Love Has Gone momentarily lifts Rouse's gloom, but it is scant relief from the stillness at Nashville's core. [Mar 2005, p.106]

Inescapably, Losing My Edge is the best thing here, yet happily Murphy has more than one trick up his stylish sleeve. [Feb 2005, p.101]

As eloquent an emotional discourse as [Gedge] has mustered. [Mar 2005, p.101]

There's a slow-burning moodiness... together with a new directness. [Mar 2005, p.101]

A workout for both mind and soul. [Jun 2005, p.97]

A Healthy Distrust turns his scouring insight upon America's turbulent recent history, the response of a vulnerable, impassioned, imperfect man. [Mar 2005, p.106]

A lesson in ageless folk rock opulence. [Apr 2005, p.97]

An overwhelming record that bends and blusters with grand passions, bittersweet beauty and no small hint of desperation. [Apr 2005, p.98]

Often he makes a lot of noise without really connecting. [Oct 2004, p.100]

This is tough, honest, uncompromising beauty and the next great voice in music. [Apr 2005, p.86]

There's promise here if they can stay out of jail or the loony bin. [Feb 2005, p.94]

An album of straight-up, dazzlingly well-realised British pop. [May 2004 p.92]

A classic work...together [her collaborators] have created a near perfect, and wonderfully paced, stage for the singer. [Oct 2004, p.112]

For all that bombast, though, there's a disappointing, un-Texan restraint. [Feb 2005, p.94]

Ghastly. [Feb 2005, p.102]

Magic.... Its rhapsodies present a portait of an artist at an early height of his powers. [Feb 2005, p.102]

There are moments when Tom and Ed no longer sound like the baton is theirs to pass. [Feb 2005, p.101]

More honed and richly-textured than former offerings. [Apr 2005, p.101]

This is undeniably a better album than they've delivered in some while, but... there still seems to be a lack of conviction in their execution. [Feb 2005, p.100]

Though not an unqualified triumph... The Great Destroyer is the latest high from a band that routinely rewards the virtue of patience. [Feb 2005, p.94]

Showcases Prewitt as an original melodic writer and arranger. [Feb 2005, p.99]

Superwolf's arrangements are pretty raw and understated--under-rehearsed, even--but for the better. [Feb 2005, p.102]

A kaleidoscopic funfair of angloid psychedelia, baroque folk-pop and open-minded sonic exploration. [Mar 2005, p.96]

For the most part still playing it breakneck and fuzz-covered, their trademark garage-scuzz-meets-hardcore blitzkreig is if anything more rough-riffed and faster. [Mar 2005, p.101]

A classy veneration of the Byrds, Bob and Band, exquisitely seasoned with phlegmy harmonies and subtle instrumentation. [Mar 2004, p.108]

Stamey makes the most of a limited vocal range. [Mar 2005, p.104]

Marrying the softest hushed-breath vocals with a lush musical sweep at once both intimate and panoramic, All Harm Ends Here captivates from the off. [Jan 2005, p.94]

Hard to avoid thinking of Neil Young and Crazy Horse at the peak of their '70s powers. [Feb 2005, p.95]

It's business as usual. [Mar 2005, p.106]

Tends to drift in one and out the other at times. [Jan 2005, p.102]

This is a very traditional U2 album, the sort of album people want U2 to make. [Dec 2004, p.96]

Not the Holy Grail that was promised... But considering what material is present, the set plays like a fairly compelling musical narrative. [Dec 2004, p.120]

The lyrics veer towards simplistic, but Destiny pull it off, mainly through muscular production and stunning vocal interplay. [Jan 2005, p.97]

Hilarious, stoned hip hop drooling with ideas. [Feb 2005, p.100]

A little too much. [Apr 2005, p.90]

An awkward faceoff between Mathers the prankster and Mathers the cultural and would-be political agitator. [Jan 2005, p.96]

Tread lightly past the handclaps and keyboard quacks to find a collection of uncomfortably honest damaged-goods love songs set in the cold hours of the a.m. [Dec 2004, p.102]

More attention seems to have been paid to assembling the cast than finding something for them to record. [Dec 2004, p.98]

One of Americana's most exquisite singers. [Dec 2004, p.114]

She seems to have a sound that needs more sophisticated compositions. [Nov 2004, p.95]

Joji draws dark arterial blood from backwoods bedrock, mining a country mile adjacent to My Morning Jacket's. [Jan 2005, p.105]

One of the most bizarre covers albums ever. [Dec 2004, p.102]

That [Psapp] completely circumvent high blood sugar whimsy is testament to the duo's songwriting ingenuity and Durant's silken vocal cords. [Apr 2005, p.89]

An album that nails its subtle-but-tenacious hooks with dignity and maturity. [Nov 2004, p.94]

Lyrically it's one of Cohen's least ambiguous albums... Musically it's melodic and memorable. [Nov 2004, p.96]

This is more than a nostalgia trip. [Apr 2005, p.102]

Bowel-rattling rhythmic rock that's as viscerally exciting as it is grubby. [Feb 2005, p.101]

The scope and breadth is startling. [Oct 2004, p.94]

At points UNKLE verge on Moby car advert territory, but judicious sampling and that deadpan sci-fi spirit keep the album the right side of experimental. [Sep 2003, p.113]

Another uniquely alluring Luna landing. [Nov 2004, p.110]

They've come within a hairclip's breadth of producing the rock'n'roll riot they always promised. [Dec 2004, p.114]

Quality control slumps toward the end, but when they're good the're grrreat. [Nov 2004, p.110]

The sound of Beans returning to the hip hop that hatched him, remaking it in his image. [Dec 2004, p.100]

Does little to extended their reputation beyond that of a band big on amp buckling bluster and low on pop harmonies. [Oct 2004, p.104]

As ever, his chord changes and arrangements betray an inventiveness seemingly borne of brilliant instinct. [Nov 2004, p.92]

The root of the malaise most surely [lies] in the protracted production, which appears to have sucked the life out of whatever good material there was. [Nov 2004, p.110]

Picks up where 2002's Impasse left off, with Buckner at large in a dusty, wide-screen landscape of brushed guitars, weeping pedal steel and decorous strings. [Dec 2004, p.114]

Arthur's delicious art is a potent, concentrated thing. [Oct 2004, p.96]