A lysergic brew of dust-blown ballads, thumping punk rock and shimmery psychedelia. The jarring stylistic clash is often part of the charm. [Dec 2019, p.88]

They remain ridiculous, but thunderingly good fun. [Dec 2019, p.91]

Highly engaging. [Dec 2019, p.96]

Krlic has created a world in which the music of ancient tradition works like a sonic virus that simultaneously soothes and eats away at your very soul. [Dec 2019, p.95]

The Afro-beat timbres peeking through also reveal more about who Vagabon is, and what she is capable of. [Dec 2019, p.95]

Meredith's precision helps control the fun, but this is another buoyant invention from her musical lab. [Dec 2019, p.95]

Embellishments frame soul-searching songs about dislocation and romantic ill-fortune--think a grittier Brendan Benson--which soon demand frequent revisits. [Dec 2019, p.86]

Almost everything here sounds pre-designed for drone-shot driving sequences in a slow-burning indie film, but in a very good way. [Dec 2019, p.86]

His wunderkind status is underlined by an obvious passion for Brian Wilson: stacked harmonies, deft chordal shifts. In Butterflies From Monaco, that Wilson influence comes laced with sturdier fragments of rock and funk a la Prince. [Dec 2019, p.93]

It still vibrates with Warren Ellis's ominous, cosmic-radiation synthesizers and loops, but Ghosteen is less tightly coiled and knotted. ... Cave finds a way to reach out, and reach through. [Dec 2019, p.87]

An album that's thoughtful, emotional, expertly crafted and often sublime. [Nov 2019, p.84]

There's a surfeit of hushed intros building to emotional crescendos, but the feeling is all real. [Nov 2019, p.96]

It's an engrossing set with nine reflective soundscapes. [Nov 2019, p.89]

Colorado feels more focused than Pill, especially so the backing vocals. [Nov 2019, p.87]

One Step Behind shifts the goalposts, compromising a 32-minute title track and the eight-minute Heart And Soul, an elegant, soulful comedown in the mould of Music From Big Pink. [Nov 2019, p.94]

Joyful and, at times, unpredictably good fun. [Nov 2019, p.90]

Bid renders the album's picaresque litany of devious noblemen, murdered knights and debauched bishops with typically knowing aplomb. [Oct 2019, p.89]

Thrilling, unpredictable and often inspired stuff. [Nov 2019, p.86]

A decent album, but perhaps not the one some of us were hoping for. [Nov 2019, p.95]

Part 2's brittle, somewhat alienating production isn't exactly subtle. ... Foals sound like they are overreaching themselves a little. Two highly ambitious, thematically-linked albums in six months was always a big ask. [Nov 2019, p.86]

[Album opener Civil Servant is] sonically inventive, with vocoder interludes and a rousing final call of "Refuse! Refuse!," but its on-the-nose swipes at "Bus-fulls of meat...staring at phone-screens" can't avoid the patronising tone of 95 per cent of all songs about "the workers," written by those otherwise employed. ... Far better are songs where Dawson locates the misery and mystery of life in smaller worlds and stranger vignettes. [Nov 2019, p.90]

Elbow reflect an unruly world here, but if they sometimes lose faith, they never lose heart. [Nov 2019, p.87]

Lanegan brings dependable authenticity to these savvy pop songs; dire admonitions, but also an abundance of swagger and fun. [Nov 2019, p.94]

The group are definitely branching out, but they've not quite reached Zabriskie Point yet. [Nov 2019, p.91]

Sparer but equally powerful record [to U.F.O.F.]. [Nov 2019, p.90]

No Home record offers few tunes you could whistle, but at it's best Gordon's no-wave din and take-no-shit snarl offer unabashedly militant thrills. [Nov 2019, p.87]

OEH are a more intriguing venture when confident enough to aim for the universal. [Oct 2019, p.86]

Exudes confidence as it cleverly tweaks harmonic principles and discreetly unveils its dramatic arc. [Nov 2019, p.93]