Uninhibited, Wrecking Ball misses a star here only because two love-among-the economic-ruins, This Depression and You've Got It, don't quite fit the big-theme fierceness - deep feelings to draw together whoever may listen. [Apr 2012, p. 89]

Bowerbirds at their least bucolic, both expanding and focusing on a sound that is as timeless as The Band. [Apr 2012, p. 89]

A bustling, concise and sunny affair. [Apr 2012, p.88]

The greatest thing about this tribute album is that ... the biggest names on it ... all bring their A game. [Apr 2012, p. 88]

A disappointment. [Apr 2012, p.88]

The instrumental work is impressive throughout, but Gidden's vocals are the main attraction. [Apr 2012, p.88]

The fire is back in his belly. [Apr 2012, p.88]

[Apr 2012, p.88]

Effortlessly inventive and still full of invective. [Apr 2012, p.88]

Ultimately, it's the combined sound of - there's no getting away from the word - ethereal vocals and cavernous, sometimes even martial dance rock that appeals rather than the detail. [Apr 2012, p.86]

It's a classic soul album, its strength lying in Fields' gift for storytelling and his extraordinary delivery. [Apr 2012, p. 86]

Consistently absorbing, as good as any of Foxx's early-'80's benchmarks. [Apr 2012, p.86]

Only a slight dearth of killer melodies ... disappoints. [Apr 2012, p.86]

It's a seductive lesson in understated beauty. [Apr 2012, p.86]

It is an easy album to like. [Apr 2012, p.85]

An ongoing reconnection with the experimental dandy in the mirror lends his latest work's stylistic pinballing a fun quotient that compensates for it's unevenness. [Apr 2012, p.84]

An album of melancholy and heartbreak that's at its best when the songs fall between all-out country rock ballads and bare bones ballads. [Apr 2012, p.84]

Hypnotic, doomy, edgy, but strangely forgettable, too. [Apr 2012, p.84]

A formidable piece of work, repositioning Mercer away from his Pacific Northwest indie rock peer group. [Apr 2012, p.82]

An album of considerable weight. [Feb 2012, p.99]

Sweet, shimmering, Swedish alt-pop. [April 2012, p.91]

COYB trade in wintery, foreboding hymnals that conjure Sigur Ros, Radiohead and an existentially challenged Aled Jones staring out across the abyss. [Apr 2012, p.94]

Ane Brun has never before sounded so alive.[March 2012, p.98]

With tensions at its core, Pre Language fuses white light with the darkness of anxiety. [Mar 2012, p.102]

In between strong original songs are arresting covers versions. [Mar 2012, p.92]

To fresh melodies of Guthrie would surely have smiled upon, the four adorn every lyric with fine guitar weaves of rollicking dance, rugged grind or Paris, Texas haunt. [Mar 2012, p.97]

This is a fine balancing of distance and engagement that put the shier back into chill out. [Mar 2012, p.103]

With the flawless Umber at its core, Bitch Magnet is final proof, if Jon Fine needs it, that his band have escaped the historical side streets of title, genre and geography, motoring out into the vast plains of Great American Albums. [Mar 2012, p.109]