It too often sounds like a diluted version of what’s gone before, a collection that struggles to reach the highs of old.

With only five tracks and little in the way of audible lyrics or melody, understandably As Light Return tends to blend into one rather murky whole. That said, after repeated listens, individual song strengths do gradually emerge.

Ultimately, Chaos And The Calm is a solid, if unspectacular, first effort from Bay.

For someone who has a lot to say and is such a unique figure in music, it's a disappointment that Light isn't as captivating as it should be.

As a whole, Glassheart is listenable, with a few ups and downs in terms of the quality of the tracks, but does tend to keep to a very steady keel of mediocrity without much deviation.

While the closing tracks have some flashes of interest, they repeatedly fall into the same saccharine McCartney-esque cliches, making the last chapter of the album as unremarkable as the first.

Too often on The Darker The Shadow The Brighter The Light you find yourself reaching for the earlier albums to listen to instead. While Skinner’s hardcore fans will be pleased to see him back, much of the time this feels a lot like The Streets on autopilot.

This collection of tracks lacks that vibrancy and spark needed to linger long in the memory. There are a few sunny moments here and there but ultimately it's disappointingly flat.

All too often, overly simplistic melodies meander repetitively as Moffat struggles mightily to stay on key.

Martyn has an incredible musical heritage and series of works in his past, and it’s a shame that The Air Between Words simply is not as interesting nor as rewarding.

King Animal would have been better had it foregone the regal pretensions and just stuck to being a feral beast. There was clearly the makings of a decent album here, but somewhere along the line it's all gone wrong.

The overall impression [is] that Alarms In The Heart is overall an opportunity missed.

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

Somehow, the expected drama or crescendo never quite arrives, and we are left with an overextended auditory shrug, sadly emblematic of the rest of this strangely unsatisfying album.

Battle Born is music played in the past tense.

The best parts of A Head Full Of Dreams are where the band cut loose and play around with expectations.... However, those who hate Coldplay with the fiery passion of a thousand burning suns will also find plenty to grease their wheels on A Head Full Of Dreams. There’s the lyrics for a start, which are almost universally terrible.

Whereas their first album hit the mark perfectly, The Pick of Destiny swings wildly and misses.

While this means that all is not lost (or perhaps more accurately, saved), it does leave the listener with a sense that he's not sure whether he wants to embrace a new direction or not, resulting in an album that is somewhat disjointed and ultimately unfulfilling.

While it's quite pleasant and occasionally curious at first, the novelty wears off.

At times The Decemberists sail close to being an horrific hybrid of They Might Be Giants and The Coral - all arched eyebrows and accordions.

For an artist who’s capable of making genre and generation defining records, Deadbeat just simply isn’t good enough. Too much fluff, too many unfinished ideas, too ponderous, too flabby.

This is an album of largely superfluous material, made only to exorcise some creativity.

Fragments does not outstay its welcome, but only because it isn’t distinctive enough to be consciously welcomed in the first place. Recommended for owners of trendy cafes and companies in need of hold music.

Though Natural Rebel has its moments, it all feels a bit staid and stale: not so much rock’n’roll rebellion as conventional cliché, both musical and lyrical.

The album is at its best when it explores glam influences: the campness and flamboyance nicely mirror the theatrical nature of The Decemberists’ established repertoire. But they would do well to learn that sticking some synthesiser parts behind a guitar band doesn’t automatically make them New Order.

Love Goes wallows too much in its comfort zone to be truly memorable.

For large parts of this record, perhaps for the first time since the group's inception, Animal Collective sounds like a band doing little more than going through the motions.

There are definite up moments in Dear John, but the odd mix of Svanängen's meandering melodies and melancholic vocals mixed with the bizarre samples and synths makes for a concoction that will either be adored or thrown out of a window in disgust.