Icily cinematic, Arnalds has a widescreen future. [Dec 2020, p.85]

The warmth of the recording and the excellence of the singer and the songs, this is up there with Massey Hall - just five songs shorter. [May 2021, p.96]

Instinctual, fully lived-in record, it touches and thrills. [Nov 2021, p.93]

Idles are finding new directions home: the hallmark of a great band. [Dec 2021, p.85]

Blind Date Party is intriguing enough to be more than a one-night thing. [Jan 2022, p.82]

For all the ways these songs frenetically pinball into different corners, the nervous scratch and scrap of guitars tightening up and unspooling around obtuse angles and machine-gun rhythms, there's a deceptively complex musicality pinning everything together. [Nov 2022, p.89]

O Monolith is no less bold of palette - opener Swing (in A Dream) embraces taut post-punk chug, jazz trumpet and enveloping synths - but always follows a lucid, compelling logic. [Jul 2023, p.86]

Kamaru's softly spoken words amid Arkives' discomfiting drones drags listeners to unexpected depths, his voice a ghost in a machine of otherworldly chorale, siren-like synths and heaps of static. [Aug 2024, p.87]

Ishibashi’s latest score is again subtle, delicate, but robust enough to blossom away from the film itself. It’s her balancing of disparate elements that’s so impressive. [Aug 2024, p.87]

Kokoko! again deliver a banging, agitational rave-up that’s impossible to stay a wallflower to. [Aug 2024, p.87]

Aswad and Steel Pulse stand proud amid JA heavy-hitters Burning Spear and Black Uhur u, while PiL, The Slits and The Pop Group mingle with the un-dread Joe Jackson, SLF and Angelic Upstarts. With Misty In Roots glaringly absent due to ‘rights issues’, there’s ample scope for a sequel. [Sep 2024, p.101]

Nada Surf have always been close to greatness, and Moon Mirror won’t win new fans, but it is wonderful. [Oct 2024, p.82]

As with predecessors Omega and The 7th Hand, Blues Blood brims with fresh harmonic ideas, but also an emotional potency that resonates long afterwards. [Nov 2024, p.90]

One of those bracing, snarky, crafted and fun records that reminds you of a bunch of old favourites while simultaneously exerting its own personality. [Feb 2025, p.83]

Due to the circumstances, guitarist Jez Williams takes the lead on more tracks than is customary, including gorgeous, Smiths-referencing highlight Last Year’s Man. But despite a difficult incubation, Doves soar here.[ Mar 2025, p.90]

Wasner downplays the rockier aspects of her previous two solo records to delve into her Joni bag, pulling out both folk and AOR models - with streaks of Americana - sourcing gorgeous melodies to match her glowing vibrato that resembles a young Lucinda Williams. [Dec 2025, p.84]

How much of ...Jazz Age was completed before Bailey's death is unclear, but his final at is one of his greatest. [Jan 2026, p.84]

Bailey has been constantly moving towards something truly great and Can't Take My Story Away gets her closer still. [Feb 2026, p.82]

Utopia feels like a diversion, not a destination. A nice place to visit--beautiful, even--but you wouldn't want to live there. [Jan 2018, p.89]

Clever, involving, vital addition to one of the strongest discographies of the last 30 years. [Nov 2023, p.82]

From One Day's po-sweet surprise to DsharpG's shivery vocal/harmonium drones, each gear shift is proof of a compelling new voice. [Dec 2010, p.100]

At it's core, Peasant resembles a masterpiece, but this softening of the sonic edges ultimately dulls its grand impact. [Jul 2017, p.94]

Their most corrosive cocktail yet of melodious sunshine pop and blackly comedic lyrics. [Mar 2023, p.85]

The two CDs move forward with an eerie dread and romantic wonder; violin, piano, bass, celeste, cello creating an alternate wordless narrative to normal Cave blather. [Oct 2009, p.115]

It is Mastodon's ability to blend such grandstanding flourishes with a powerful sense of songcraft that suggests Crack The Skye might be some "Master Of Puppets" breakthrough for the Atlanta quartet. [May 2009, p.98]

Upbeat, sometimes painful, all sold with witty pop chutzpah. [May 2019, p.94]

Despite its unruly title, Anarchist Gospel takes all the splits and divisions, the churn and the confusion, and turns them into something remarkably centred and complete, the work of a songwriter who knows who she is and how she got there. [Mar 2023, p.82]

His best (if worst-titled) work so far. Sometimes JPEGRAW's 12 tracks feel like they're ticking boxes: a flurry of lounge piano blues here, a blast of jazz trumpet there... But there's a clarity to the writing, with his vaulting ambition accompanied by strong hooks and an even stronger pop sensibility. [Apr 2024, p.84]