Allowing Talk Talk, The Chameleons and David Sylvian to swell the ranks of recognisable names and the odd mystifying entry too - on what planet is The Wake's English rain ethereal, dream pop or showgaze? [May 2023, p.98]

A beguiling sigh in itself. [Aug 2023, p.81]

Short it may be, but Happenings is full of ideas. [Aug 2024, p.83]

It’s a truly gorgeous record, capturing the grand contrarian at his happiest, living in the present and reworking the past. [Nov 2024, p.89]

Allison is as vocally ethereal as [Kendra] Smith and Newcombe as filmic and adventurous as [David] Roback. [Mar 2025, p.92]

The opening Witness introduces philosophical detachment which anchors Oliver's sceptical worldview throughout as he hovers between the sanguine and the sly on rousing yet playful anthems like the title track or the funky The Trick.[Sep 2025, p.84]

A steely-eyed desperation to succeed is transparent all through Hard-Fi's debut. [Aug 2005, p.112]

Producers Mike Elizondo and Rob Cavallo smooth away many of the rough edges, and it's the tracks that escape the industry sander that are great. [Mar 2013, p.87]

A richly downcast experience, his deft arrangements recalling the powerful, orchestrated cloudbursts of Curtis Mayfield's solo debut. [Feb 2022, p.82]

Her jazzy instincts and surreal lyrics perfectly offset the music's mosaic minimalism. [Sep 2009, p.92]

It finds Glasper trying to maintain the interest of his new audience by putting a trio spin on neo-soul material as well as songs by Joni Mitchell and Radiohead. [Aug 2015, p.91]

[Body/Erase's] opening six minutes resemble an accidental recording made inside an overcoat pocket before mediated snatches of feedback further hint towards this maverick tape manipulator's dark art. [Jan 2022, p.82]

With a voice now dry and shaky, Friedman nonetheless revels in his novelist knack for tall tales. [Dec 2015, p.86]

Devoid of da funk it may be, but the scale and scope here are impressive. [May 2023, p.86]

Tight Knit is a beautiful, lazy album of befogged West Coast dreams. [Apr 2009, p.107]

A sprinkling of more angular, dissonant tracks, like the clanging Eastern Stack, may sail a little too close to his soi-disant "jazz that nobody asked for" for some tastes. [Jan 2018, p.96]

Shakedown and Sell Your Soul feel triumphant in a way indie-rock has rarely managed of late, while an intoxicating weirdness drives even their most anthemic moments. [Jun 2014, p.93]

Consider this a Zen disc: sit with it awhile, and it will come to you. [Nov 2002, p.105]

Bowie's best album for 20 years. [Oct 2003, p.104]

Mostly it's just business as usual with Van in reasonably good form. [Jun 2005, p.95]

There are a couple of songs hidden away in the backwaters of their patchy debut which hint at something much better. [Apr 2006, p.88]

Beyond the singles-"Melody A.M." lapsed into a latterday jazz-funk. This album sometimes tends the same way, but interest is reignited by Royksopp Forever--ELO with dancebeats--and the tracks where Lykke Li and The Knife's Karin Dreijer-Andersson approach Robyn's unhinged lager-umlaut Europop berserkersim. [May 2009, p.104]

Jonny's debut is splendid, user-friendly stuff. [Mar 2011, p.97]

Hard blues, soul and R&B take a back seat to pop tunes with a elegant turn. [Oct 2016, p.92]

Always a unique voice, Phillipps is as refreshingly conciliatory as he is arrow straight. It may be nothing particularly new, but it's the way he tells 'em. [Oct 2018, p.90]

These 10 duets/duels can be pretty gnarly, but there are beautiful epiphanies, too. [Jul 2020, p.82]

Whatever is behind Sigur Ros's ineffable Nordic magic, it doesn't appear to be powered by electricity. [Dec 2007, p.98]

The thrill lies in eavesdropping on experiments-in-progress, ad as much in the quest itself as in the flashes of genius that occasionally arise. [May 2022, p.106]