It's an irresistibly modern mix. [Dec 2018, p.89]

A strong melodic streak can reach those Husker Du pleasure-pain receptors, but equally often they're quirky to the point of throwaway. [Jan 2019, p.93]

Trouble Anyway is a much more fleshed-out, even lush proposition [than her 2016 debut, Out Of Love]. [Jan 2019, p.90]

The result is another madcap sonic escapade. [Dec 2018, p.87]

Strong, tub-thumping songwriters fall prey to Nashville cliche. [Dec 2018, p.94]

Across the ensuing 85 minutes there are sufficient six-string pyrotechnics, pop hooks and lyrical urgencies to shame an artist a third his age. [Jan 2019, p.88]

Amor's main reference point is arguably Arthur Russell, though there's little of his joie de vivre--unless you count the cowbell on Heaven Among The Days--and more the cold fire of Martin Hannett-era A Certain Ratio. [Jan 2019, p.89]

It's easy groove doesn't suggest exhaustion, just peace of mind. [Jan 2019, p.84]

The deadpan vocals of Camila De Laborde means that The Knife comparisons are difficult to shake, but they mirror the bold, ethereal quality of the music. [Jan 2019, p.89]

Spare, simple, languid, often Ens lacks, ironically, is a wildness. In the end, it's just a little too tame. [Jan 2019, p.85]

The results are as wildly evocative as anything by Steve Reich or Terry Riley, but thunderously affecting on their own terms. [Jan 2019, p.85]

Stylistically, the album juxtaposes grungy art rock with punk-jazz, electronica, and hip-hop, though it's McCaslin's tenor sax and aesthetic vision that imbues Blow. with a sense of unity and coherence. [Nov 2018, p.95]

The result is 12 exquisitely dreamlike, personal songs that also work as Krgovich's coming out album. [Nov 2018, p.89]

A lively set that's way above par. [Jan 2019, p.92]

The songs are gorgeous, lyrical, chimerical, the arrangements weighty, complex and cool. [Jan 2019, p.89]

Clapton's guitar still sings, howls and weeps, but this is for the staunchest God-heads only. [Jan 2019, p.90]

Chilled psych-folk from a surreal world. [Jan 2019, p.92]

Note Eaglehurst/The Palace, an ecstatic workout that mythologises a shared house of Brit jazz tyros as an inspiringly sacred space. [Dec 2018, p.92]

Joplin's long, devastating plea for salvation once mirrored the big story--that the surprise star of '68 had outgrown her rough diamonds. The 30 tracks here, several in multiple versions, don't necessarily change that. But wart'n'all, Big Brother were the best foil Janus had. [Jan 2018, p.101]

On Reflection swirls, flutters and swoops like leaves on the breeze. [Jan 2018, p.89]

Think Jolie Holland, or P.J. Harvey's To Bring You My Love, and prepare to be entranced. [Jan 2019, p.90]

The 2018 Beggars Banquet is classy slim-line history: clean, heavy vinyl with restored artwork (but no linernotes); a 12-inch platter with a mono mix of Sympathy; and a flexi-disc, originally included in the 1968 Japanese pressing of the LP. ... Sometimes, even in rock archaeology, the final result is all that matters. [Jan 2019, p.96]

This lavish 36-track celebration doesn't settle for just reheating the best bits, cheerily omitting anything from Kamasi Washington's jazz clarion call The Epic, while proffering 22 new tracks that flaunt its roster's strength in depth. [Jan 2019, p.105]

The single-disc edition offers a streamlined look at Cornell's career, cherry-picking some of his finest moments and complementing them with rarities. ... For a totalising retrospective, the 7-LP, 4-CD, 1-DVD box set is essential. [Jan 2019, p.104]

It's not tidy, but fittingly for such unabashed pop maximalists, there's a lot to love here. [Jan 2019, p.84]

It's a journey beyond self-consciousness and towards mature vulnerability, to an evolved idea of what is musically pure. [Jan 2019, p.82]

It reframes familiar, comforting songs of joy, innocence and goatherds within pitiless orch-industrial rock and suspicious pop softness, rediscovering the original's Nazi-assailed gravity and reflecting on a divided Korean peninsula and the international power relations beyond. [Jan 2019, p.84]

Gently atmospheric rather than a disrupter of mood. [Jan 2019, p.86]