It's a mightily impressive achievement.

Theirs is an easily digestible, less angst-ridden take on grunge, with a fizzing, infectious youthfulness to it. Definitely one to keep a close eye on this year.

To write it off too early would be criminal, as Embryonic represents The Flaming Lips at their most awkward, most engaging, and most creative.

There is a hidden depth to much of 2 which belies the outwardly bright nature of many of the songs and the cheesily trad imagery.

As a tribute to Molly Drake and an effective realisation of her music’s full potential for the listener, it’s a resounding success.

It's when listening in this way [on headphones] that the nuances of the music, with its dark underbelly, open up and reveal themselves in a weird yet absorbing way.

There's a feeling that This Is My Demo is just geared too much towards the commercial audience.

A Common Turn is a questing and provocative record that’s both remarkably dynamic and audaciously exposing.

Whether All Them Witches’ fans will approve in droves is unlikely, but instead of burying their heads in the sand maybe they should embrace the bands continuing evolution because at times it’s simply spellbinding.

Williamson has never been mournful in quite the same way that he is here, nor so disappointed in what he sees around him, whether it’s politicians, musicians or just ordinary people. This comes through not only in the lyrics but in their delivery.

Of all of the guest-heavy Gorillaz albums, this is by some margin the leanest, meanest and grooviest set of the lot.

Mackenzie Scott seems to have reached that stage of her career where she’s just happy to please herself, and it’s resulted in her best album to date.

This is a good, and sometimes great album, that feels like it’s a few tracks short of being a masterpiece.

The sounds on Microcastle form a lush landscape.

It’s an album that has facets from across the spectrum of experimental electronic music but, in the hands of the masterful sonic auteur Matthew Barnes, Forest Swords’ music sounds triumphantly singular. This is a very special album.

Crack-Up is, in its way, just as exhausting a listening experience as Pure Comedy.

Micah P Hinson is a natural byproduct of his time and place, but he's also an artist with a steady hand and an unflinching eye for the gruesome details.

This is comfortably Roberts’ most colourful recording and, whilst it retains the hypnotic quality of his delivery, also takes another significant step in his development a living, breathing artist going well beyond the curation of folk traditions.

This could be the biggest revelation of the lot. It simply does not get any better than Love.

This is a confident, vital and highly uplifting record.

It’s not as immediate an album as Lost In The Dream, and a couple of quality control lapses prevent it from being a truly great record. Yet it’s still a dauntingly accomplished behemoth from a group who grow in stature with every release they put out.

Superstar doesn’t quite hit the heights of its predecessor – at times, it feels like the whole concept of the album’s theme is getting in the way of creating a fully flowing album. When it works though, there’s enough evidence that Rose is still very much a superstar herself.

If a devil-may-care attitude is the album’s strength, it also can be a weakness. Songs hit or miss by chance, the product of unmoderated experimentation which can so easily become indulgence.

FOREVERANDEVERNOMORE remains an engaging, expansive and thought-provoking album.

It makes for an excellent reintroduction to an artist who proves that her music knows no boundaries, be that linguistic or otherwise.

With its 16 tracks clocking in at 63 minutes, it’s the band’s longest album to date and, despite a smattering of classy highlights, it feels laboured and cumbersome. With that in mind, the album as a whole falls short of The National’s best work. Yet it is, in places, an admirable detour.

Mercy may have a few forgettable tracks, but an artist with John Cale’s long and varied history will always find a way to intrigue the listener.

This New View is pleasant, but a little more of the old fire would be welcome.