This record is a triumph of belief and dogged determination over those people who thought he was a barnacle on the coattails of his famous friend.

It makes for a frequently breathtaking companion to ‘Take Me Apart’. In a debut album which was all about breaking down, ‘Raven’ reminds us of what it means to be put back together.

[Flowers] bares more on Wonderful Wonderful than ever before, and the result is the band’s best album since 2006’s ‘Sam’s Town’.

The beats and lyrics get better with each listen.

After living with it for a while, you’ll come to appreciate ‘EYEYE’ as a record that breathes, sighs and will leave you lost in the same dazed revery that these tracks were born from.

His latest album is as likeable as he seems in interviews: assured but unassuming and sometimes hard to fathom.

There are some dull ballads towards the end, and the title track’s flimsy R&B isn’t even redeemed by its righteous opening line: “My love is more potent than anything in the cup you’re holding”. But like all the best pop stars, Larsson shines bright even when her material lets her down. And when it matches her, she’s basically irresistible.

Akpro’s debut is a dark, winding ode to the UK capital, grounded in his own experiences and expressed with a subtle mystery. This sense of nuance – often missing so early in an artist’s journey – makes for one absolutely captivating listen.

The vocals and instrumentation help the album ultimately overcome its few shortcomings, such as its occasionally unwieldy lyrics (“I’m scared of flies / I’m scared of guys” is one such culprit on ‘Valentine’). Yet the lyrics also give us one of ‘Everything I Know About Love’’s primary delights: Laufey’s candid self-expression wrapped in the dreamy lilt of the old jazz standards.

Waterfall sees the shadowy 24-year-old advance the weird, industrial sonics that caught everyone’s attention in the first place into even bolder territory.

It’s a full-bodied album and a journey--a journey we hope it doesn’t take them another decade to make again. Hopefully Jack’s telegram reaches his bandmates a little quicker next time.

Overall, it feels like listening to a rocket preparing for take-off before shooting out into deep space, and if this doesn’t get you dancing, you’re probably clinically dead.

The band have responded by unleashing their ballsiest selves.

Intimate and inventive, it’s a beautiful exercise – and one that could provide a bridge between last year’s ‘Any Human Friend’ and the musician’s planned return to melancholic material on her next original work. For now, though, she’s given us a rich new world burrow into, filled with soothing familiarity but brimming with the excitement of the new.

The emphasis is on soft, kinetic beats, with melodies pulled out of unpromising materials--discordant synths, laser pulses--and it’s one whacking great testament to what dance music can do with a bit of imagination.

On a lesser album, the eclecticism might lead to a lack of coherence, but this record is always threaded through with Beer’s diaristic lyricism. With its consistent, gut-punching honesty and witty wordplay, you’ll always find something special on ‘Life Support’.

A compelling record that bears more resemblance to the indie of Bright Eyes or Modest Mouse than anything found on 2003's 'Deja Entendu'. [18 Nov 2006, p.33]

The Last Shadow Puppets is an awesome achievement--a modern reinvigoration of an archaic, dead musical language.

Black Lips’ spirit is as bright and brilliant as ever.

Great album, if not entirely relaxing.

The album may not be teeming with experimentation – and somewhat understated in places – but it’s certainly potent enough.

If 'Wind In The Wires' is not exactly an innocent record, then, it is certainly sincere. And that sincerity, allied to such extraordinary sounding songs, makes for an exhilarating experience. [12 Feb 2005, p.49]

While Nasty’s catalogue has found her focused on pushing to the extremities of self-expression – baking rock, screamo and punk directly into her rap with reckless abandon – with this record she flexes her chops as an artist with mainstream appeal.

‘The Dream’ continues the slow, rewarding blossoming of Alt-J’s records, each a little more generous, thoughtful and optimistic than the last. ... It’s the sound of a band revitalised, having finally found their happy place.

There are few smiles cracked on an album that’s shot through with the loneliness of the night bus home. But this is a record in the true sense of the word: a document of a certain time and place, an emotional account of a cruel, Krule world.

‘The Theory Of Whatever’ shows that – unless he chooses to hit the eject button for himself – Jamie T should be sticking around for a lot longer.

‘Service Station At The End Of The Universe’ isn’t the mark of an artist finding his sound, but a confident, authentic trailblazer who knows his craft inside out.

The production values on You Are We are perfection--too many metalcore records overproduce until notes feel clinical. But ‘Feel’ builds and drops like an avalanche of brilliance, Taylor’s voice firing off a round of vocal ammo with ease.

The stories Rose tells are as fresh as wet ink.

Their future as a metal act with their fingers on the button seems assured.

With his finest tracks lasso'd together, you can notice the immaculate progression of James Murphy.

Alongside stripped-back, warm and hazy versions of the always powerful ‘Ohio’, ‘Alabama’ and ‘Southern Man’, Young’s new take on 1977’s ‘Campaigner’ hits especially hard.

‘Fighting Demons’ is evidence of a nuanced, complex artist whose legacy is stunning in its richness.

If you imagine the noise God makes just before he eats a slice of cheese on toast, then comparably, that’s how satisfyingly yearning the 65 minutes of 'Takk…' sounds.

In any other hands this would have been a total disaster, but yes, things are never quite that simple with these two.

Across 11 tracks, Jessy Lanza has delivered her strongest album yet: ‘Love Hallucination’ is a record that boldly soars towards synth-pop ecstasy while retaining its experimental desire.

These are some of the most interesting and sonically varied songs of her entire career.

A truly lovely thing to behold; a pretence-free, summery shimmy through pop's enchanted garden, with tear-tugging Bacharachy bits and choruses of angels and everything.

‘Multitudes’ was written in part during an experimental and communal set of shows Feist put on through 2021 and 2022 by the same name, and 12 poetic tracks that make up ‘Multitudes’ embody the same inventiveness, intimacy and connection of that limited run of performances in the round.

Heartbroken, but heavenly.

They may be Pivot no more, but they're turning heads – and for all the right reasons.

Though longing and mortality have long been recurring themes in Dacus’ music, the stakes feel even higher – and even more gripping – when there’s so much to lose.

Banks, Kaufman and Barrick prove far more than the sum of their parts, turning on a bright light of their own.

In the poetic and thoughtful nature of it, as well as the odd glimpse of where she could go next, WILLOW’s fifth record should be noted as her breaking sonically mature new ground.

It’s perhaps not the best month to be showing such unabashed love for Phil Spector, but timing aside, this is an outstanding album.

Far from softening Parquet Courts’ edges, [producer Danger Mouse] has enhanced everything that makes the quartet great--sound, imagination, style. The Beastie Boys, Black Flag and Talking Heads are all here in spirit.

The Temper Trap relocated to london in May of this year in a bid to woo the uk: this is not a bad calling card at all.

One Thousand Pictures is pop in a tar-pit--black and sticky, but wonderfully pure at heart.

[The songs on Majenta] confirm Edgar's inimitable creative talents.

There’s almost something for everyone on Dose Your Dreams, and, thankfully, that eclectic aspect to Fucked Up’s most ambitious project yet means it leans more towards opus than hopeless.

This is the unmistakeable sound of a star being born: this is an album with something to say, in a voice all of its own.

It works well as a fun stop-gap before Segall’s next solo effort, ‘Emotional Mugger’, arrives in January.

Following the birth of her first child, the underappreciated Laura Veirs recorded an album of mostly traditional folk songs for children, which has charm far beyond the nursery.

A record, feels truly – and brilliantly – emblematic of the sharp, controlled chaos that Paris Texas have honed over a handful of previous EPs.

What's extraordinary about Otherworldly--its expressive saxophone blare, heavy afro-funk workouts, hepcat proto-rapping and unyielding positive vibes--is that it feels like these dudes haven't aged a damn day.

Mountain Battles is both a joyfully lived-in and boundary-free album.

180 doesn’t contain too many weak moments; only the tacked-on-at-the-end ‘Brand New Song’ feels properly superfluous, an in-joke they’ve run a little too far with. Otherwise, you’re struck by the strength of the songs, and the roguish, self-assured charm with which they’re delivered.

This record is not the sunburnt wooze of Tame Impala: it’s angrier, colder.

It’s truly dreamy.

Lost Friends is a set of pile-driving anthems that demands your undivided attention.

Father of Asahd isn’t perfect, and the celebratory baller vibe can get a little tiresome at times. However, this time round, whenever Khaled shouts “Another one!”, his catchphrase, it actually feels merited. DJ Khaled’s true talent lies in bringing people together.

It’s an all-enveloping record that puts the listener at the centre of the overwhelming intensity of Ferreira’s life these past few years – and offers a front-row seat to her wrestling back control.

Exploration of I, Gemini reveals its quirks are knitted together with extreme smoothness.

The immediate reference point would be a Swedish Coral to the power of ten--but it's more mental, more hippy and psychedelic. [14 May 2005, p.67]

They have a new sound, a warm, lush and funky noise powered by producer Danny Sabre's sympathetic programming alongside Tony Rogers's bold keyboards, and they've created a great party record with it.

Those in search of a tightly cohesive album knitted around a single concept have probably come to the wrong place entirely – but for a sprawling answer to the band’s two huge 2019 breakthrough records ‘Two Hands’ and ‘U.F.F.O’, then look no further.

These nine songs often build and build only to splutter out in a last, exhausted gasp. And then the next track cranks up and the cycle continues, giving the record a grinding, thwarted sense of frustration.

The heavier moments refuse to act as a sledegehammer of alt-rock pastiche, which this record could so easily have been. Instead, it’s a showcase of songcraft that’s allowed to breathe and reveal itself. Bring on volume two. The dream lives on.

This is the sound of a band at their most confident, capable of still pushing the boundaries they seemingly reimagined years ago without overwhelming audiences with their own love for endless improvisation. There are no lyrics on this album, but it feels like you can hear these three musicians louder than ever.

‘KiCk i’ incorporates pop, experimental, noise, electronica and psychedelia into one project. Amid a highly acclaimed career, Arca’s latest album presents a new high-water mark.

By the mirrorball moment that heralds the lengthy coda to the closing ‘It Girl’, you’re left giddy and breathless, applauding a 20-year veteran who’s finally found his voice.

The result is a record that’s as fun as it is furious, and as confrontational as it is cool.

Being adventurous can often mean over-reaching but, in this case, the production turns familiar elements into one of Fucked Up’s most intriguing recordings yet.

There’s more space and sophistication to The Spark than we’ve seen from Shikari before.

With a lust for life, the once-dark prince is letting the light in.

An intense, emotional record.

It's a fine build-up to the Selkirk quintet's fourth album, due out early 2013.

If the Dutch producer's last album 'Great Lengths' was an exercise in contemplative, spacious dubstep, then Ghost People is instinctual; muscles tensed in observance of the cerebellum's basest of commands.

As thrilling as Gwen, as badass as MIA. [17 Jun 2006, p.37]

It’s an album steeped in balladry and strummy, sad-girl pop, each track a soft unraveling of her inner world. And yet, coming from Rosé – an artist who has long had to keep her personal life under wraps – this stripped-back approach feels nothing short of bold.

There’s still a sense, at its heart, of a warm, yet slightly neurotic overthinker, sat at a mixing desk in his bedroom, possibly in his big white underpants, and just going wherever the spirit takes him.

The risk pays off.

Cronin’s knack for languid songwriting is enhanced by adding more opulence.

It’s a marvellous return to form for an act that possesses such unbridled creative energy. We’re glad they’ve been put to joyous use this time round.

No great leaps forward from ‘Everything All The Time’ and ‘Cease To Begin’, just lovely, warm-hearted, full-throated harmonies and gentle melancholy.

It’s an accomplished listen – still as deliciously dramatic as ‘Prelude To Ecstasy’, fleshing out their world more and more with daring, dashing songs of true depth.

What could have been an act of self-sabotage or self-indulgence – or both – has transpired to be a welcome reminder of all that this band does best, rooted in raw relevance for today and the cyber-punk energy of tomorrow.

‘Positive Mental Health Music’ is chaotic and warm at the same time but there’s star quality at every turn. It’s not always comfortable, but this is a confident and brazen debut that channels emotional turmoil into something positive and familiar.

It’s the social commentary that makes this experimental album feel vital and unifying. Okereke lyrically eviscerates the politicians who’ve caused divisions based on race, wealth, sexuality and gender, but also offers a vision of hope and a desire for England to rebuild.

This surprise is an entirely pleasant one. [27 May 2006, p.33]

It’s their most mature and measured album, both lyrically and musically.

Even when things get musically darker on the shimmering alt-pop of ‘Posing In Bondage’, there remains a prioritisation of pop melody; the fat is trimmed from all 10 songs on the record, leaving perfectly formed three-and-a-half-minute pop songs that want – and deserve – to be blasting out of your radio.

MBV is not really an album at all, but an oeuvre in fast-forward.

As debuts go, True Romance is an astonishing statement of intent – if they’ve got any more ideas left after the 10 tunes here we could have a rather special band on our hands.

First, the good news: 'Celebrity' is pretty damn fine too.... The bad news is that 'Celebrity' definitely shows signs of that discontent that all boyband members begin to feel after a while, and it's this which might well put some fans off.

It’s maturer in sound and ideas, but retains all the hallmarks of what made Fleet Foxes so great in the first place: rich and studied folk compositions, unrivalled harmonies, stories that strike to the core of nature and human existence, and a dedication to art that emotionally lifts you off this planet.

This is a thrilling joy ride of an album.

Oddly for an album so big in scope... it's very intimate and confessional. [3 Jul 2004, p.64]