This record feels like half reboot and half memoir. She goes out of her way to acknowledge the fact she’s not a teenager anymore, but with a gentle defiance, a little nostalgia and a subtle change in direction that makes Golden both touching but also really good fun.

It is delicately shaded and tells us more of her hopes, dreams, fears and feelings than any interview ever could. It is this direct communication with her listeners, coupled with the strongest of loyalties to her underground heritage, that makes her music as strong as it is.

This album is too much of a mess to be seen as a worthy follow-up to such a great debut.

Plenty of time is wasted on auto tune, to the detriment of almost all the album's vocals.

It features roughly one good tune to every two mediocre ones.

McGuinness is having a fantastic time on this album, but the try-too-hard attempts at shock value and relatively derivative riffs occasionally detract from what is an otherwise fantastic recontextualization of British alternative rock into older trends.

Gardens & Villa, though, is an album that casts light on its creators' vices as much as their virtues, and, for all the honesty that implies, remains a drawn-out suggestion that the band ought one day to generate a long player more worthy of their principles. Still, not bad for a first go.

At 46 minutes, Recurring Dream isn’t an especially long album. But on the wrong day, at the wrong time and in the wrong frame of mind, it can feel like the longest 46 minutes in the history of all time.

Whether the record would have benefited from the band focusing more on fewer tracks is debatable, but Wicked Nature is in many ways a miniature triumph for an outfit written off by many as has-beens.

The most pleasing element of the album is those earlier demos floating around the internet, have for once been well produced. Songs such as Bandits now have an added edge with more strength, depth and substance to the original foundations.

there are occasions on Girl Talk when we get glimpses of what another, better Kate Nash indie rock album would have sounded like.... Unfortunately, moments such as these are the exception, not the rule, on Girl Talk.

It adds up to Folds' finest record yet, and while nobody would dare suggest that Nick Hornby would give up his day job, a sequel to this fascinating collaboration would be more than welcome.

There's a confidence obvious throughout that suggests Sparro will build on what is a strutting debut, even if at the moment he's a big voice with too many small songs to sing.

Black Acetate is in equal measures, serious and mocking, threatening and comforting, ambient and rowdy.

The music here is, at times, superb--it’s just hard to imagine anything (except maybe Rose On Top Of The World or Killed Someone) finding a place in your permanent playlist. And a lot of it is just average, which is probably the worst thing you could say about a band as mercurial as this.

It’s About Time has joyous, feel-good highlights and low points that could have been worse.

Perhaps the global impact of the massive Call Me Maybe is what makes the album as a whole feel like a damp squib, but with or without US Marine parody videos, the rest of the album fizzles out into synth-pop oblivion.

It’s by no means perfect and it does feel slightly one-paced, but the layers of Heritage are undoubtedly worth unravelling.

When certain songs occasionally come within touching reach of greatness, it’s most often through their distinct resemblance to other acts.

It’s become a rather saturated market and, with the ability to craft stunningly effective vocal harmonies and melodies still intact from their early guise, Hegarty’s music is so much more.

For all its ’80s and ’90s pop influence, nothing here sounds dated.

What 85% Proof is, above all, is comfortable, with all the pros and cons that entails.

Yesterday Was Forever provides plenty of evidence that she can still hit top form when she wants to.

Musically it turns out to be blissful business as usual for Ernest Greene on his fourth album under the Washed Out moniker. The bittersweet sentiments remain but they are beautifully expressed and wrapped up in classy production, with a notable tension that hangs on every song.

Whilst there are occasional high points, it’s best to cherry-pick the highlights from Didn’t It Rain and leave the rest.

The duo have set themselves up nicely in a burgeoning genre and whilst their likeness for monochrome isn’t exactly bright, their future surely is.

Overall, Veronica Electronica justifies the hype, bringing us an artist at her peak seen through the lens of well-chosen remixers. It is the ideal companion to Ray Of Light, her alter ego emerging from the darkness of the club to a moody but ultimately uplifting soundtrack.

Where RMX works, it is outstanding, but it is let down by too much flabby excess that for all its artfulness, weighs the album down like a millstone round the neck.

Version is destined to become one of the great party albums of the summer - just playing it once is guaranteed to cheer you up.

When Wildflower works, it works beautifully.

This is an album which feels like it was made quickly, not because of artists reaching a terminal velocity of creativity, but to take maximum advantage of an audience who may not be there this time next year.

The Fat Whites’ second album is, then, something of a mixed bag, but the most offensive thing about it is not the lyrical content, it’s the fact that the band doesn’t seem to have the courage of its convictions and say what it means in an intelligible manner. Their edge has been knocked off in a cloud of reverb.

Klinghoffer wisely makes no attempt to mimic Frusciante; the new boy on the block's musical talent is obvious in its own right here, and the musical partnership that has formed between the older members of the band and Klinghoffer is evident. Red Hot Chili Peppers are not quite ready to slope off yet.

Glow And Behold has its ups and downs and isn’t quite the coherent, self assured package that its predecessor was; instead it’s the sound of a band reconfiguring, trying to work out which way to go and what to do next.

While the band’s penchant for steadying, shimmering guitars and unexpected use of instruments certainly appears on VII, it’s not enough to overshadow this album’s lack of originality.

For their entire career, The Polyphonic Spree have succeeded not necessarily when they’ve sounded big, but when they’ve been the leader of the pack of the weird. Many of the tracks on Yes, It’s True suggest that the band is thankfully moving back in that direction.

Whilst this is an album that will draw comparisons to the band that made her name, it is a fine, if long overdue, solo effort.

The entire album was recorded in just five days flat. It may have been knocked off in a spare moment between Guillemots albums, but in Fly Yellow Moon Fyfe Dangerfield has made a very early contender for one of the best albums of 2010.

A very odd and somewhat unpredictable partnership, but one that is pleasantly surprising in its own way.

If this is just the start of an artistic resurgence then it'll be interesting to see what comes next. You feel that he's just getting started again.

He has spectacularly failed to make an album that has any bite.

This is a fun indie pop record that will not change anyone's lives but will get you bouncing off walls very easily.

The album works best when they pick up the pace, cranking out two minute gems like My Mind Is Like An Atom Bomb and They Kiss Like Humans, with its genuinely disconcerting backing bellows.

There’s no wild pretension and little real originality here, and it’s not going to change your life or make any critics’ Greatest Album lists, but it’s a lot of fun, and sometimes that’s all you want.

In many respects, Green’s music feels like it belongs to an era much earlier than the 21st century. Yet in a modern industry that can often seem to be dominated by formulaic performers, Liz Green remains highly relevant as that rare exception. A true original.

For anyone wanting something new, exciting, raw, intoxicating... then this isn’t for you. If, however, you know what you like, don’t like taking risks, want an easy life when it comes to spending money on music and are already a fan then you’re going to be satisfied with an album that probably ranks dead centre amongst their full catalogue.

So, an unexpected turn from our commentator on urban squalor with this dreamlike, abstract paean to Mother Nature and the great outdoors.

Considered as a whole, or even as two self-serving parts, Saturday Nights And Sunday Mornings is so generic and unenlightening that you will probably not remember hearing it within an hour or so.

Donkey is not the greatest thing since the peanut Kit-Kat, yet there's some indie-tastic fun with a hint of electro punk, a bit like The Gossip but swapping the Ditto scream for Lovefoxxx's sultry, breathily seductive whisper.

For those who have enjoyed Grubbs’ wide-ranging career and don’t mind taking a 45-minute detour into the mind of a clearly talented guitarist and singer (complete with painful violin), The Plain Where The Palace Stood is good enough to demonstrate how great Grubbs can be when he hits the mark.

All in all, it’s hard to see this appealing to anyone other Gabriel completists.

Simply put, his music seems alive, and utterly modern – despite its clear and obvious debt to The Beatles. ... This is a staggering work, a monumental achievement – and easily eclipses any of Jones’ acting to date.

Out Of Control is, generally, yet another excellent album from a group who may have risen from a lot of people's 'guilty pleasure' to becoming full-on national treasures.

While it contains a few filler songs, this is a fun album to listen to, bursting with irrepressible energy.

While a few of its tracks are below par, The Constant is a decent first effort. It doesn't put her head and shoulders above the many other female singer-songwriters kicking around at the moment, but it definitely sets her apart from them.

More than anything it's just a relief to see this rare talent back from the brink, still, as always, one step ahead of the game

Gilmore has merely rendered Fever more American market-friendly and given it a strong flavor of stateside nu-metal. It's a pattern that is just too repetitious, too anodyne and just plain insipid.

While the album is described as a myriad of styles, there’s nothing to really demonstrate this: only the reggae and reggae-related genres are consistently and tiresomely reflected.

While some of the studio tricks are a little too familiar, the band is clearly re-invigorated and, unlike like the last fractured Garbage offering, the result is a cohesive collection of sharp, aggressive songs.

It also feels like they've become a little too cosy in their favourite slippers, so that while Dive Deep is a pleasant album, it swims in familiar and safe waters.

They're heading back to form in time to conquer a festival or two - but the nature of that song does leave you wondering if Franks will just be happy to be back at all.

Throughout the entire album, you’re left wondering how Smith, who is responsible for some of the most untouchable, spontaneous punk classics of all time, could muster the audacity to purposefully sound like such a parody of his previous self.

Things start to become a bit samey three quarters of the way through the album.

Final track aside, this is as close to blissful shoegaze perfection as is possible.

It's a mature progression for a talented band who, having started out at the tender age of just 15, now seem much clearer on which direction they want to take.

Like its companion album, it’s wildly inconsistent but when Prince hits form, it’s difficult to argue with the man’s genius.

There’s little going on beneath the skin here and it’s an unfortunate if sadly inevitable fact that other significantly more talented musicians from Iceland will never attain Of Monsters And Men’s levels of popularity.

If only they worked a little harder at it, they could be so much more than indie fodder for those who find Kasabian's recent work a little too experimental.

It would appear that Tim, Tom and Richard have spent some time at the U2 School of Squillion-Selling Records, their final project sounding more expansive and dramatic than Hopes And Fears ever did.

Lightburn is on fine form throughout – vocally, he’s been compared to Morrissey for most of his career, but on Lovers Rock he’s more like a downbeat Damon Albarn.

The overall effect of Skeletons is akin to being poked and prodded by a bratty child for over half an hour.

With songs that are inspiringly teeming with originality and ideas, Courtcase 2000 is as exciting and mind expanding a record as any this year.

Overall this is an unpretentious and varied album of rave stompers, hands-up disco and sedate moments of beguiling ambience that combine to form probably his best and most cohesive album since "Play."

If Alanis lacks breadth in terms of her subject matter, and she does, she makes up for it in the rich variety of styles that have influenced each track.

This is, truly, an album worthy of obsession.

In summary, Drones is utterly bonkers and silly. And yet, it’s for the most part enjoyable.

All The Plans is full of driving piano, anthemic guitar, and a bit of swagger. They owe a huge debt to Coldplay, Ocean Colour Scene, and Oasis which, in itself, must be quite galling.

Producer Will.I.Am's contributions are, for the most part, utterly bland and lacking in bite. The sanitised R'n'B of Heaven is embarrassing with a generic construction that feels as if he went to a superstore and it took it off the shelf.

Once the irritatingly catchy melodies have passed through a love/hate relationship though, to the point where they may start to annoy, there is sadly not enough left to warrant a long lifespan for Youth.

Despite the solid highs, there’s nothing truly spectacular and the end result is rather uneven in terms of quality.

Portico have certainly succeeded in reinventing themselves, and they sound like a completely different band to Portico Quartet. The flipside of this is less positive: with their synth textures and post-dubstep influences, they don’t sound all that different from much of the pop music being made at the moment.

With only one true standout track, a handful of fillers, and little innovation or progress, it reeks of diminishing returns from start to finish.

Complete Me is a clever, well crafted and painstakingly produced pop concoction that was well worth the numerous delays.

This is a fascinating record that will initially bewilder, but rewards repeated listens.

When it hits the spot, Moby’s writing is still subtly powerful, but when it doesn’t a curious and lasting emptiness remains. This may accurately reflect the imbalances of the world, but as a musical work it ultimately feels off-kilter.

Not a bad effort, but we've come to expect more.

Yuck, however, sadly comes off after several listens as a little flat, the low points seeming all the more so for resting, as they do, in the shadows of the occasional peaks.

It’s the sound of a band who have slowly taken the time to consider how their evolution should develop, and this deliberation has borne fruit. Wildness may well have grown, but for Gengahr, something rather more long-lasting may have also taken root.

This debut is a polished effort which manages to balance both sweeping synth pop with euphoric indie anthems.

For all the humming and picking, the songs feel too similar to each other to hold interest throughout.

While this may not be his finest solo moment (that honour still belongs to his debut, "Rockin' The Suburbs"), if you want some intelligent, moving and addictive pop songs, you can't go far wrong with Mr Folds.

It’s not perfect, but it does point towards promising a future.

MGMT seem to have settled into their groove here, or more correctly their two concurrent grooves. On one hand, they seem able to produce easily digestible fuzzy pop songs slightly reminiscent of soft rock with what appears to be consummate ease; on the other, they can enter into all manner of sonic digressions with a noteworthy lightness of touch.

For better or worse, Thievery is ultimately content to stick to the script, busting out another batch of worldly background noise perfect for a post-party VIP lounge in Ibiza.

The album may revive the band's career in North America, but for many of their loyal fans it will come as a major disappointment.

Despite these quibbles, there’s a definite sense on Life By Misadventure of a major step up from Human. It’s a conscious move to move Rag’n’Bone Man up to the level of the likes of Michael Kiwanuka and Ray LaMontagne – if he carries on at this trajectory, he’ll have a career to rival them both.