It's neither an easy nor a joyful listen, but tolerate the unrelenting gloom and it is never less than absorbing.

It’s all very sedate and relaxing, and while that works beautifully throughout the album, sometimes you just want to hear Regan turn it up a notch. Yet, maybe that’s not the point – it’s possibly Headphones that sums up the album’s ethos, a song about being literally wrapped up in music, and it’s that immersion that O Avalanche is best experienced in.

In short this is a album that you put on for instant and disposable thrills.

Working with producer Chris Coady, I Break Horses embrace the power of slowing things down considerably. Many of the songs rarely get as speedy as a trot, and indeed, the opening track Turn, takes a good nine minutes to slowly detail a dissolving relationship. This, then, is music to get lost in, even when the content is at times worrying and dark.

An envelope-pushing record, admirable in its ambition even when the thread gets a bit lost.

There are a couple of occasions when Goldfrapp's new relaxed attitude shades into lazy songwriting: Dreaming and Hunt are bland. But overall Head First is skilful pop designed for adults.

Throughout Friends That Break Your Heart, Blake is trying on different sounds, different styles, and producing some good music along the way, but he ends the record still unsure of where he should be.

Fans of her debut may be a bit bemused, but this is a new direction that could lead to great things.

Virgin may not be Lorde’s most polished album, but it’s certainly her most compelling and revealing

As well as this angrier, more focused lyrical approach, some of the arrangements on Raskit are pleasingly minimal.

Deciding which music you listen to in a world that now benefits from so much of it is another tough choice, but in the case of The Jacket, it comfortably feels like it could be a very good fit for many.

It may have taken some time to arrive but Two Trains is a strong personal statement that should find wider appreciation.

Soft Control is an album of neatly constructed soulful pop songs that anyone who likes the artists it references would enjoy.

Division Street finds Simon in the midst of finding his own voice.

On an album that clocks in at only a little over half an hour, the band's fight against the dark forces would seem to be one that they've come out the better from.

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.

Surrounding contemporary anxieties within a collage of expertly designated snatches of melody, the record feels slight at first glance before eventually revealing its complexities to the listener, without ever suggesting notions of self-pity.

Queen Of Golden Dogs is Vessel at their most direct and bold, and the result is often overwhelming, sometimes confusing, and always fascinating.

At their best, they’re untouchably brilliant but on this outing they haven’t quite been able to maintain the elevated standard established early on over the course of the full album. Still, for fans of melodically charged guitar-pop there’s much to enjoy here.

Somehow, all this variety works well more often than not.

The second half of the album slows the pace somewhat and perhaps suffers after the thundering EDM and lyrical onslaught of the first few songs. ... Yet, for the most part, Innocence Reaches is a triumph of adversity and experimentation.

There are catchy and effective tracks here, though also a niggling sense that she has turned her considerable talents towards sounding more like everybody else.

This is awkward, sharp elbowed music that requires time and effort to fully appreciate, yet the complex textures and image-laden, thought provoking lyrics will gradually reveal themselves to those prepared to be patient.

Despite its flaws, it’s still an album that contains some of Dacus’ best work to date, even if the record itself is not her strongest. If you’re having withdrawal symptoms while waiting for the inevitable second Boygenius album, Forever Is A Feeling should sate you somewhat.

In short, it’s no puzzle to see that there’s no revolution here, and little is opposite to what you’d expect. It does, however, prove their sky remains far from blackened.

Colour Of The Trap may not spring any surprises but it's easy to get caught up in Kane's beguiling web of '60s sound.

The tracks are well made and good stuff, but on the whole Urban Turban feels a little too all over the shop to pack the wallop it deserves.

As ever with Amos’ more recent albums, it’s a bit overlong and some songs, especially in the album’s mid-section, float by without ever making much of an impression. ... Yet when Tori is on form, she still sounds as vital and exciting as she did 25 years ago.