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]

It's hard to imagine CRB ever re-inventing the wheel, but boy do they know how to roll. [Sep 2016, p.96]

But despite its mining of a bygone age, Cosmic Egg has two clear 21st century counterparts. Far Away and Violence of the Sun are the sort of pristine epics found on Guns N' Roses' Chinese Democracy., while lysergic piledrivers 10,000 Feet and the title track could easily have appeared on Kasabians' West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum. [Dec 2009, p. 96]

They're more likely to be judged on face value, but that shouldn't do them any harm. [Sep 2009, p.95]

These guileless, well-hemmed songs could use a few more frayed edges. [Dec 2012, p.96]

Unfortunately, much of the rest veers from lightweight to teeth-grindingly irritating, suggesting a private joke that perhaps would have been best left in private. [Sep 2009, p.93]

Swaying choruses and gutsy musicianship.... there's life after the circus has left town. [Mar 2014, p.93]

The elements that make up Best Of times were all there before, but even the band concedes that they have finally found their true sound. [Apr 2014, p.90]

It's a mixed affair. [Feb 2015, p.91]

Octopoidal, Milford Graves-style fee jazz, miraculously achieving a sort of zen clarity. [Jun 2024, p.92]

Prince's 26th album will be remembered more for its method of distribution--a reactionary tabloid's covermount CD--than for being tighter and more tuneful than 2004's "Musicology" and last year's "3121." [Sep 2007, p.113]

Subtle string and brass arrangements add to the brooding, stylish swing, evidence that some things never go out of fashion. [Sep 2002, p.97]

This is miffed and exemplary metal. [Jul 2003, p.108]

No "George Best," perhaps, but a rugged, well-meaning Paul Scholes of a record nonetheless. [July 2008, p.100]

Sampling Serge Gainsbourg's quivering strings for 'Sensitized,' however, only serves to highlight the album's lack of truly knee-wobbling moments. [Dec 2007, p.98]

While the band's strength lies in inventiveness of their composition, the end result isn't as enjoyable to hear as it surely was to make. [Sep 2010, p.102]

Outlaw doesn't deliver six-pack sagas, instead he offers Bottomless Mimosas as a morning pick-me-up. [Jun 2017, p.93]

[Mykal] Rose's takes on Screaming Jay-via-Nina Simone's I Put A Spell on You, Roosevelt Sykes' 44 Guns and Johnny Otis's Bad Luck Shadow are superb roots with Rose's voice imbued with passion and sincerity. The remainder falls miserably short though, due to mismatched material, misdirection and worst, liberal use of incongruous heavy blues-rock guitar. [Aug 2019, p.97]

Whether Liam Gallagher's band is the start of a new story or a diverting subplot to an on-going saga remains to be seen -- and you can imagine where the smart money lies. [Mar. 2011, p. 92]

Some are enchanting. [Oct 2014, p.90]

Has lingering '80s elements, with some pompous lyrics, laborious arrangements and long, drawn-out vowel sounds, yet it is also fresher and less strenuous than before. [Apr 2004, p.114]

The CD reveals R.E.M. still have plenty of fuel to throw upon their smouldering career. [Jan 2008, p. 100]

The cumulative effect is wildly narcotic. [Oct 2002, p.100]

The power and import of the record is undeniable. [Oct 2001, p.112]

Nearly a decade later, their new album attempts to recapture the moment of dancefloor serendipity and only occasionally do they succeed. [Oct 2011, p.99]

As seasonal cheer goes it slaps seven sleigh bells out of dreary old Stille Nacht. [Jan 2012, p.90]

Pierce's lyrics remain largely opaque, and the atypically lumpen Warm Hand In Narnia sounds unsettlingly like Snow Patrol, but to cavil feels churlish when elsewhere such vivacious invention pervades. [May 2013, p.86]

It may not eclipse past achievements but does point to a genuine way forward in a dignified and spiritual manner. [Jul 2013, p.84]

The 23-year-old Ethiopian-Canadian's sonic evolution continues on Kiss Land. [Oct 2013, p.88]

Await Barbarians reminds of Alex Chilton or even Liam Hayes's earliest music as Plush. [Jul 2014, P.87]

Anyone with a dog-eared Thick As A brick or A Passion Play album will be familiar with the rich brew of prog, folk, metal and whimsy he has served here. [Jun 2014, p.95]

Pleasing, but lacking his early melodic strength. [Jul 2015, p.96]

The father-and-son combination is satisfyingly unpredictable, with a fresh, non-rock approach to some of the rhythms and unexpected shifts in style. [Jun 2017, p.86]

A journey, then, one exploring the psyche of a man and his relationship with the world. [Jan 2018, p.90]

There is a grab-bag of variety. [May 2020, p.93]

All Roads Lead Home holds together surprisingly well. [May 2023, p.86]

The results are less out-there, but mostly play to Allison's strengths. [Oct 2025, p.91]

Flowing with an easy energy, it's the last track on an album that shows Madonna still firmly on the dancefloor, but with her eyes now turning to the USA. [June 2008, p.106]

Even if there are moments when Rockstar seems under-amped, you have to admire her chutzpah. [Jan 2024, p.89]

Wanderlust sees the singer execute an elegant slide into a more stately kind of pop. [Feb 2014, p.88]

Unobtrusive producer Tony Hoffer again extracts clarity while adroitly leaving the sense of a happpy mess. [May 2008 p.112]

The debut set from New Albany's Houndmouth suggests there's more to them than nice skinny jeans. [Aug 2013, p.88]

A third of these songs can rightly be claimed as classic Placebo pop. [Apr 2006, p.106]

As ever, it's best to not to take them too seriously. [Nov 2009, p.90]

The results can, surprisingly, prove as musically rewarding as they are entertaining.

He's made the album he should've made right after Maxinquaye -- i.e., a listenable one. [Jul 2001, p.112]

A richly rewarding album. [Nov 2002, p.114]

Despite one-time Rudimental leader Amir Amor's rather flat production and the dearth of all-out tub-thumpers beyond the wry The Lads, they've transformed themselves inti a differently beguiling proposition. [Mar 2024, p.88]

Drawing elements from both [previous albums], Horses And High Heels is a similarly accomplished if more playful affair. [Apr 2011, p.94]

Glow's most enduring memory might just be the grand '80s synth-pop---think Pet Shop Boys or Alphaville--of things To Say. [Apr 2014, p.93]

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

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

His most conventional and, frankly, dull [album] pursuing a plodding take on alt rock, in the uninteresting middle ground between early U2 and Stiltskin, with occasional dashes of doom-lite. [Aug. 2011, p. 101]

The Fratellis' third album is simple and uncomplicated. [Nov 2013, p.94]

Recorded using vintage hardware, the guitar sound is as rich as tiramisu. [Jun 2014, p.95]

A deeper dive into the grooves pays substantial dividends, not just with Doherty's impermeable gift for melody and neat turns of phrase but the intriguing torrent of witty self-examination. [Jun 2019, p.86]

It starts in fine fashion. ... Tellier's Auto-Tuned croon is unrelenting, and by the album's mid-point we're approaching the realms of self-parody. [May 2020, p.89]

The hardest working man in indie rock today shows no sign of taking a break. [Feb. 2011, p. 100]

None of these tunes conveys a fraction of the emotional ardour of those on the first (self-penned) Sun Kil Moon album. [Feb 2006, p.103]

Rice doesn't dismiss outright the folky troubadour charm that distinguished O, but here it's a springboard for jealousy, sex, misery. [Dec 2006, p.104]

It's clear that The Pop Group are back in full swing. [Dec 2016, p.90]

The ersatz '80s production, lyrical platitudes and soft focus atmospherics stray uncomfortably close to parody. [Jun 2013, p.85]

Only the faithful need apply. [Jul 2006, p.101]

In a crowded space, The Rakes have a place to call their own. [Apr 2007, p.96]

A clear rejuvenation, the occasional triteness that softened earlier work largely absent from these close-woven songs. [Nov 2003, p.125]

There's only fleeting glimpses of Jason's weakness for dimestore Minutemen angularity. [Sep 2002, p.104]

It's in essence a wordless, monochrome Television. [May 2006, p.104]

It's pleasingly dizzying, yet curiously coherent. [Feb 2016, p.98]

Chinese Democracy reveals itself to be an ambitious, brave and expansive offering. [Feb 2009, p.108]

In no way startling, but elegantly put-together all the same. [Jul 2014, p.92]

Though no Pet Sound, this album, at its best so wistfully reliving out golden yesterdays, ranks up there with Today! [Aug 2012, p.92]

Hourglass plays the "I, an artist" card with equal earnestness, a collection of electronic songs that mix dungeon-master sexual predation with angst-ridden introspection. [Nov 2007, p.104]

10-decent-but-not-exceptional songs, Sleeper ultimately sound a little anachronistic; just not made for these times. [Apr 2019, p.89]

Here, he is still the anthem addict of old, but there are softer, subtler electronic textures and a real sense of reflection. [Nov 2005, p.112]

Queasy melodies, light-headed keys and emaciated Smiths guitar flourishes slowly generate a dank unease. [Nov 2012, p.95]

FramesPerSecond is an atmospheric introduction. [Aug 2017, p.90]

It proceeds funereally, as if in the suspended animation of a nocturnal hallucination, like sleepwalking through a dark and empty airport, but also right there in the room as Wave Pics' on-the-fly magic unfolds. [Sep 2018, p.93]

But, for all the technical proficiency, there's a sense of nobody ushing themselves too hard. [Mar 2024, p.91]

The result is their best and most thematically complete album since Achtung Baby. By turning towards their past, U2 have found their way back to the future. [Nov 2014, p.88]

What could have easily sounded like an extended theme tune for Blackadder proves a classy and durable listen. [Jun 2012, p.88]

Musik, Die Schwer Zu Twerk's 30 minutes stand on their own despite nods to Flaming Lips' darker side and Linear Downfall's fascination with early King Crimson. [Sep 2014, p.91]

The Pretties turn in a brand new album of mostly original material recorded the righteous way on analogue gear, displaying considerably more energy and invention than most what's around today. [Nov 2007, p.108]

A profoundly ordinary, deeply monotonous LP. [Apr 2002, p.100]

Cook has attempted to vary the Fatboy formula here but it's all gone a bit "mature".

Eventually Janka Nabay's updating of Sierra Leone's bubu beats gets under the skin. [May 2017, p.95]

Don't take Tellier too seriously and you have a seductive, gently amusing pop album. [Jul 2012, p.90]

It's possible that it all makes rather more sense to the creators than it does to the listeners. [Jan 2014, p.102]

The appealingly titled Oblivion With Bells continues Karl Hyde and Rick Smith's desire to capture the Freon-and-neon static of modern life. [Nov 2007, p.92]

If anything, she's dreamer, the tempo's a little more down, the mood more twilit. [May 2009, p.101]

Although there are many acts occupying similar territory, the quality of Grey's songwriting and delivery elevates much of the material here. [Jul 2013, p.94]

All six track here confidently align The Cairo Gang alongside kindred neo-psychedelicists like The Lilys, it's brevity never wearing out their charms. [Aug 2013, p.90]

The Stones' I'd Much Rather Be With The Girls, written with her in mind in '65. best captures the 72-year-old. [Jun 2016, p.96]

The faithful can still but with confidence--these are polished performances--but others may weary of a long journey round past glories. [Feb 2017, p.96]

An off-the-mark stab at Nebraska-era Bruce Springsteen vocals casting a grim shadow over what was a slow burning lament. Thankfully, Wildness's remaining portfolio is stuffed with hooky but soul-bruised cuts. [Jul 2018, p.96]

Lashes panoramic drum'n'bass rollers (Living In Recycled Times) to pulsing deep house (The Beginning Of The End) and amniotic ambient (Prism). [Jun 2023, p.95]

As each song features a different vocalist and each is a snapshot, it's difficult to tell which character is singing, to get emotionally involved or to keep up with the story without much refernce to the book. [Apr 2010, p.103]

It's nigh impossible not to succumb to their hurtling energy and panache. [Oct 2013, p.94]

The album is a masterclass in elegiac navel gazing. [Oct 2010, p.90]