As I Am sees the piano songstress breaking free of her saccharine chains and delivering a streetwise, smoky set of real soul.

While they’re not bringing anything musically innovative to the table, they’ve re-packaged the sounds in a way that feels distinctly 21st Century. It’s extremely good fun and presented without pretence – and that feels like enough.

On a scale of Speech Debelle to Klaxons, they're more towards the Gomez end of the list. Definitely loveable. Largely inessential.

'The Private Press' isn't a remarkable record - it lacks that startling and instinctive excitement capable of pushing music into the realm of the era-defining.

Musically it’s akin to the recent Neon Neon album, but Kilfoyle’s musings on romance and class are all his own.

‘Quarter Life Crisis’ moves between moods that translate to bright, Day Glo colours (‘Kid Genius’) or dark goth accents (‘Die Alone’). But the former can often turn grating.

What saves that song ["Slow Motion"] , and indeed the album as a whole, is Monica Martin's honeyed voice; it's full of soul, even when the arrangements aren't.

Amid the admirable artistic confrontation in this record, there’s a gnawing impersonality that plagues many of the tracks here. There’s enough diamond material shining in the dirt to make this one of the most inventive posthumous albums that’s been released in recent times – it’s just a shame that the album doesn’t fully execute SOPHIE’s unique vision.

Zooming sheets of spacious wind-tunnel prog and raw, solo-spattered soul. Commercially, it's suicide. [26 Jun 2004, p.55]

It looks like a Mariah Carey album, it sounds like a Mariah Carey album.

The results are lush, psychedelic, often funky and always immaculately produced. But compared to, say, Cosmogramma, it sounds unadventurous and polite, as if Alias has grasped the sound of Fly-Lo et al rather than the spirit.

A horrible, hysterical splurge of splenetic punk rock, processed beats and whimsical experimental chaos. Which is no bad thing. [5 Feb 2005, p.51]

It’s another tension that helps to define ‘Girl With Fish’ — a sense that nothing holds so much weight that it can’t be taken elsewhere in the next moment. While that idea perhaps keeps these songs from being as memorable as they could be, it does occasionally work, shaping the album into a really nice cut of slacker-noise.

Stateless is impeccably executed, but also unsettling to the point of off-putting.

Teasing the limits of pleasure and agony, 'Black Foliage' is a messy, irritating listen. But it's worth persevering just for those odd moments of gorgeousness.

If you like your rap homespun, rich, physical and all 'summer-in-NYC '95', it's a dream. But considering he once reinvented the genre, it's disappointingly reactionary.

As on their debut, the sound is slick and polished and the songs are snappy and unpretentious, but there’s a lack of wit or invention.

Overthinking might be the enemy of rock’n’rollers everywhere, turning their instinctive licks into convoluted nightmares. But, in the case of Let’s Rock, a little more time fleshing things out from fine to thunderous could have made a world of difference.

Yes, there’s joy to be found in hearing a musician so unshackled from expectation and finding catharsis in the experience. But Boy Voyage lacks a running thread, centrepiece or concept to build itself around. It’s a wild, space-age trip that could do with a return ticket back to Earth.

Free Weezy Album is one of those records you sift through for flashes of greatness, rather than sit back and let it wash over you.

All pleasant enough, but makes you wish he’d just let his songs explode into a euphoric mess every once in a while.

There's plenty of interest here, then--but is anyone still listening?

Rat Boy’s international profile might be growing, but he’s not ready to conquer the world just yet.

This is business as usual: string-laced Americana that ranks alongside other literate types such as The Shins or Midlake.

‘Think I Need It Too’, the best thing they’ve done in ages. And yet, much as we want to love it, the rest is a pulled punch.

While The 1975 don’t own radio-rock just yet, Rituals feels a little too much like Deaf Havana have lost sight of their own signature, while hammering at the heels of Healy’s.

Allowing bonus points for successfully merging personal lyrics and shuffling beats without once evoking lazy trip-hop, she still too often confuses blandness for adult sophistication.

The Lover Chanting EP is, admittedly, inoffensive and low-risk. However, it’s a solid enough attempt at breaking away from the ‘band that does collaborations’ tag.

The highlights aren’t enough to make this album feel as vital as top-notch Sia efforts – namely, 2014’s ‘1000 Forms Of Fear’ or 2016’s ‘This Is Acting’. For the most part, these are reasonably catchy pop songs that become forgettable after their last chorus.

Breathy, sophisticated and existentially troubled. [2 Sep 2006, p.19]

Jenny 'Rilo Kiley' Lewis, and Jonathan 'Just Recorded Under His Own Name' Rice's brand of folk-indie-pop--jangly guitars, sweetly shared harmonies, echoes of the Deep South--isn't groundbreaking, but probably wasn't supposed to be.

They may be strutting right down the middle of the road, but they look pretty damn cool doing it. The Soft Pack make being A-OK into something to be proud of.

The line between self-aware irony and tragically conforming to type is thin, though, her knowing winks getting stuck in a tangle of false eyelashes, and ultimately undermining what had the potential to be a powerful artistic statement.

Named after a fabulist, yes, but still not quite fabulous.

As ever, their relentless chirpiness can grate, but the orchestral indulgence has been pared back, giving ringleader Tim DeLaughter’s songwriting room to breathe.

Stories Don’t End is smoother than a drive down to Malibu with the Eagles chilling in the back seat.

His molasses-coated cooing works well along his sparse arrangements. [17 Sep 2005, p.58]

The magnificence of their live show is lost a little on an album that screams 'organised fun' more than 'spontaneous party', but mostly it's giddy garage rock.

Its DOOM quota is surprisingly small. ... But is the record good? Unquestionably. Is it fun? Very.

Ultimately, from start to finish, you know what you've ordered: proficient, precision-executed blues-rock with few genuine surprises.

Some bars are simple to a fault – a continuous problem throughout the record. Luckily, ‘Formula OneDa’ shows a lot of promise. Other songs represent her strong storytelling better as she seamlessly shifts between grime, dance, and hip-hop, delving into a wide array of themes.

All those years in Audioslave have smoothed Cornell's appealingly rough edges, and as grand as King Animal occasionally sounds, it lumbers when it should roar.

Dre and Snoop forgot the legacy they created for the West Coast with ‘Doggystyle’ and – although there are flashes of fun – the forgettable collection barely scratches the surface of their legendary status.

‘Meet The Woo 2’ does feature some slightly lacklustre – take the disappointing ‘Foreigner’, featuring fellow New York rapper A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie. A Boogie’s sloppy delivery might have been scraped entirely from the mixtape. Yet Pop Smoke’s latest is one for the mosh-pitting party goers. He definitely proves that – in his own words – “you can’t say pop and forget the smoke”.

It often feels like an in-joke that we’re allowed in on.

Sadly, towards the close the balance is lost and the fine-but-inessential ‘Summer Moon’, ‘Weeds Through The Rind’ and ‘Schlager’ end things on a weak note.

The issue is, however, that it’s perhaps lacking in variety. Although the rocket-fueled, lightning-paced ‘More Than You Know’ and the gently atmospheric closer ‘Childhood’ do offer changes in pace, there’s only really subtle things differentiating many of these songs from each other. Sometimes, the hooks aren’t as strong as they could be.

For all the music's cagey intelligence, Drake sounds like the kind of guy who comes sauntering out the traps in a 100m race and immediately breaks out into a victory lap, pausing only to remonstrate with hecklers.

Viewed in isolation, ‘Heaven’ is a pretty sublime pop-punk record. Its little brother, ‘Hell’, yields more mixed results, continuing the metal-infused sound Sum 41 have veered towards in recent years.

‘Trip At Knight’, like many of the rapper’s other projects, is an uneven affair that suggests a lack of quality control.

It’s all accomplished and well-produced--as an introduction to these sounds, it’s absolutely on the money--but perhaps too scattershot to really gel.

Fans of their debut won’t be surprised by anything on here, but Kllo’s dexterous variations on a theme should win them over regardless.

The result disturbs something of the original's gauzy ambience, but there are some fine refigurings.

Yet cringingly vibed-up first words aside – where we're also leaving the Eurovision cheese of 2 Hearts--the follow-up to 2007's debut, Idealism, is not all bad.

The problem for Athlete is that Coldplay are returning in a matter of weeks to show how it's really done. [29 Jan 2005, p.59]

Despite its five or six great tracks, Graduation feels more and more like the work of a follower, not a leader.

he may toy with everything from Detroit techno to dubstep, but Harvest Festival hangs cohesive.

This experimental concoction Redd delivered is a hit-or-miss.

It might not kill the Mumford and Butler clones, but The Hunting Party is an energetic effort at least.

Tinashe flips so aggressively between genres that the record becomes unfocused and sporadic. Of course there’s nothing wrong with Tinashe showing emotional duality, but in transitioning so sharply from R&B to rap to stadium pop to EDM, ‘Songs For You’ makes you feel a little dizzy.

Though ‘Send A Prayer My Way’ doesn’t always grip you with the immediacy of either Baker or Scott’s respective solo careers, it’s still refreshing to hear two very well-established songwriters exploring such distinct new territory together.

It’s a shame the editing isn’t as tight all the way through, but these grooves sure are deep.

Individual tracks can feel forced rather than organically nurtured. It all means that by the time they hit ‘Making Up Numbers’ and ‘Everybody Wants Me’, there are no longer enough new tricks in their bag to hold our attention, and ‘Emergency’ bleeds away without a climax.

Taking cues from ’60s free jazz, dub and disco and combining it with the punk-rock sensibilities of their former outfit, Watersports is a delirious fever-dream of an album.

For the most part, his rasping punk is a sexy but grotty treat.

The star’s hubris is no more apparent than in its sheer breadth and lack of quality control. At 25 tracks in total, Scorpion is way too long--even by Drake’s own standards--and simply doesn’t need to be.

It's relentless, occasionally breathless but always absorbing. [4 Sep 2004, p.73]

Overall, ‘Reprise’ is full of dignified reworkings that don’t offer too many surprises.

At its best, the album is a selection of polished and inoffensive pop songs, but at its worst, it’s forgettable.

At its most cute, on the sublime ‘Intrusive Thoughts’, it’s a gauzy roll in summer hay, but when the guitars start to scowl it quickly turns from fey to feral.

Non-conforming, ‘The Off-Season’ is a little bit off in places and its steadiness can be one-note, but it’s still a strong piece technically. You might not play this album every day, but it would still be a strong record for J. Cole to end on.

Their careers adviser-flouting debut is in the mould of the greats rather than carving a new sound.

A collection of offcuts revamped in the industrial style that has characterised his recent work--isn't [a latter-day masterpiece that will spread his appeal beyond his hyper-devoted fanbase].

While this record is unlikely to bring the band or the cultural touchstones they cover back to the top, it’s a soul-searching move that satisfies their own fandom while showing they’ll never compromise.

It’s true that in parts Battle For The Sun, Placebo’s [sixth] studio album, will give the open-minded/easily-fooled aspartame butterflies in the stomach, methadone iris dilation and nicotine-patch heart tremors.

Aside from hollering his name or catchphrases--“Another one!”, “Bless up!”, “We The Best Music!”--there’s no doubt Khaled’s formidable connections were the driving force behind Grateful. But, even with a dream team like this assembled, Khaled hasn’t located the ‘major key’ to the masterpiece he desired.

This LP could have injected some creativity back into 4/4, instead it settles for quaintness.

The result: essential listening for members of the Lambily – Carey’s famously loyal fanbase – and an intriguing, sometimes fascinating artefact for everyone else.

From the brief flamenco break in the pummelling ‘Night Night Burn’ and the doomy guttural rumblings of ‘In The Name Of’ to the horns-up thrash anthemics of ‘Distortion’, ‘Metal Galaxy’ is a wild ride that, through its sheer energy, is somehow infectiously accessible.

Will only sound sweeter as summer draws nearer. [19 Mar 2005, p.59]

What White has done with ‘Fear Of The Dawn’, in fact, is row his experimental tendencies back a little, as if to meet the desires of his audience halfway. Unfortunately, that can make large chunks of the ensuing record a confused and purposeless mess.

Breezy and club-ready standout ‘What’s Next’ isn’t too dissimilar to ‘Laugh Now, Cry Later’; the quietly simmering ‘Wants and Needs’, which features a glittering star turn from Lil Baby, evokes some of the more brooding parts of ‘Scorpion’; and ‘Lemon Pepper Freestyle’ is the kind of exuberant freestyle cut that we know Drake likes to close his projects with.

Not quite double thumbs aloft then, but way fabber than it has any right to be.

It all adds up to an overlong, slightly repetitive but ultimately compelling album of two halves.

Missteps are few. Instead of taking a battle-axe to what came before, ‘WOMB’ refines Purity Ring even further. The subtle experiments pay off – even if you may sometimes wish they’d surprise you more.

Experimenting with different vocal registers and taking advantage of how harmoniously her voice goes with live instruments, she’s shared a collection that should leave you itching for her next step. If these are loosies, it’s proof of how top-notch her craft is.

It is pleasant, and largely forgettable.

The Seduction Of Kansas is a fun, dancey funk-punk record that benefits from Congleton’s lightness of touch, proof that you can step outside your comfort zone and maintain your sense of self.

On their third release Asobi Seksu have toned down the fuzz’n’raunch of old and come over all Cocteau Twins-y and mature--not necessarily a bad thing, just quite a bit less visceral.

There are simply too many stodgy slowies. [13 Nov 2004, p.57]

He has some bangers, despite being pretty hit or miss. This second stab at musical longevity is exactly what it says on the label: all over the place. But at this point in his musical career, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

These are well-penned tunes. They just don’t do anything special with them.

Covering so much ground (‘Hydrate’ even bridges dubstep and reggae) means the album lacks a clear narrative or overarching theme.

To be clear, the good outweighs the bad here, but Tinie has lost a lot of the charm that, when he turns it on, makes him so appealing.

It’s only when he plays to his strengths that On My One comes into its own.

Much of this record plays like a tribute to '90s miserabilists Red House Painters, all phantom-like reverb over misleadingly comforting folk tropes.

You'll be comfy, you might spot some pretty things on the hard shoulder, but ultimately it doesn't get you anywhere.