This isn't a great departure from The Coral but mainman James Skelly's increasingly witty words and ear for a killer jig put this in a loveable place of its own. [Aug 2003, p.95]

Rolls by like a summery blast of mid-'60s AM radio. [Sep 2005, p.89]

Post-techno production adds a depth and sheen to these fragile ruminations on the melancholy minutiae of existence. [Aug 2002, p.110]

Humour saves the Liars. [Sep 2002, p.110]

An overpoweringly diverse record. [Aug 2003, p.92]

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]

This is chic pop electronica. [Aug 2005, p.101]

Much sparser and looser than we are used to from David Sylvian. [Sep 2003, p.101]

Dour, sub-Velvets melodies and droll, haiku-like lyrics tinged with desperation. [Sep 2001, p.110]

Alluringly odd. [Mar 2002, p.112]

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

Johns has finally learned how to cull from his influences without plagiarising them. [Sep 2002, p.95]

This concise yet rewarding selection... allies Beans' oft-celebrated intellectual rigour to commendably rock-solid beats. [Mar 2004, p.104]

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]

The core remains Roberts' discomfitingly pure way with diction. [May 2005, p.109]

They deliver breathless, urgent rifferama, elements of which can be traced to RATM, The Stooges and Placebo.

Courageous eccentricity it is, then. [Jun 2005, p.106]

A quirky yet coherent whole. [May 2002, p.97]

His relentless intelligence is itself a consolation, bearing gifts of order and sly humour -- though not so many haunting tunes as on, say I'm Your Man. [Nov 2001, p.100]

More accessible than of old. [Mar 2003, p.108]

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

A compelling exercise in craft. [Jul 2005, p.96]

Windsor For The Derby have finally planed away the rough edges from their music. [Dec 2002, p.110]

OOIOO instill Boredoms' cosmic clatter with an air of genre-bursting adventure and mischief. [Nov 2005, p.108]

They're a group that believes in a thing called love. Happily, however, they don't believe in a thing called restraint. [Dec 2005, p.98]

Not a record for those prone to depression, but a varied, substantial and intriguing one. [June 2002, p.112]

Not a crossover record, but invigorating. [Mar 2002, p.114]

A tendency to indulgence... undermines the album's overall potency. [Aug 2005, p.96]