What compensates for 'Keys To The World''s shortcomings... is that voice. [21 Jan 2006, p.33]

‘EBM’, then, goes some way to bringing the seasoned band back to what they do best, all the while pushing things forward.

The album, frustratingly, proceeds on a perplexingly flat note. Clocking in at 14 songs, one wonders if the ferocity of ‘Grooming My Replacement’ could have completed a memorable ten-track collection, with the final few tracks lacking that consistent cutting edge.

Though this is her most creative record to date, the lyrics stick to safer territory.

While ‘The Darker The Shadow’ is ambitious, packed with witty, insightful commentary on the human experience, its conceptual focus allowing plenty of scope for creative flourishes, it ultimately lacks the incisive punch of his earlier songwriting.

Though these are often beautiful and uneasy songs, too many of them feel rudderless.

Not a bad record then, but one that's debased by the disappointment of one of the UK's bright hip-hop hopes selling soul rather than surprises.

While these might not be Nilsson finest ever songs, it’s nothing less than a joy to hear him singing again.

It's a consistently engaging combination. [18 Feb 2006, p.35]

He ought to save the apologies and descend into full-on self-loathing mode more often.

Despite a handful of lacklustre moments on the album, ‘Everything Else Has Gone Wrong’ permeates the band’s trademark sound with fresh ideas.

Their stark sound might not be for everyone, but Williamson’s sideways swipes at pop culture and his own big nights out are as hypnotic as Fearn’s punked-up electronica which, despite its simplicity, is nigh impossible not to move to.

That’s Your Lot isn’t the instant-classic debut they might have hoped for, but it delivers on their early promise, and offers tantalising hints at where they might go from here.

The Best of Luck Club is not quite as immediate as the bruising garage-rock intensity of her debut, but this is instead a world-building release.

The choice to join forces with so many artists was always a huge risk, and unfortunately, it sometimes ends up dampening the charm that first set them apart from the masses. But in the moments where it does come together, it’s both epic and intriguing as hell.

This rag-tag collection, dating from between 1999 and 2010, sets out his stall as an outsider savant in an Ariel Pink vein.

Nobody can deny this mini album flirts with brilliance, and feels like a pop cultural moment straight out the gate; we just wish there was a little more to it.

When it works, the results are astounding.

While her commitment to reviving the golden age of hip-hop by harking back to the likes of Lil’ Kim and Foxy Brown is admirable, it looks like we’ll have to wait for Milli’s next release for that consistent collection of sure-fire hits we know she’s capable of delivering.

Ultimately, comeback albums are about consolidation rather than reinvention, and there’s just enough of the old ‘Smart’ magic here to satisfy the retro crowds. But there’s little sign of a route to relevance, and that’s not something to sleep on.

It’s admirable to see him balance his signature sound with hints of exploration in collaborations such as ‘Monsters You Made’, all while remaining true to his mother tongue.

Much of the 'Smith's music is reassuringly familiar, barely changed over their previous 12 albums, a mix of loose-jointed Stones raunch and vast power ballads impressive enough to bring out the 40-something in all of us.

Maybe Beth Orton, unlike some of her still-desperate-for-kudos contemporaries, is merely growing old gracefully, but clearly gracefully aging doesn't necessarily make for great records.

It's only on 'Ghetto Stars' when that ominous whisper comes to the fore, that Mixed Race excites, and a cascade of strings that don't so much make us yearn for past glories as wonder what Tricky thinks he has left to prove.

There's a tiny bit more to Mystikal than mere male piggery set to damn fine production.

This album feels more like a deserved victory lap than a forward step or a new instalment, but apart from his sole vocal on 'Feel So Close', the victor seems oddly absent.

Equal parts lo-fi sketch-like song structure and buffed-to-a-shine ’80s soft rock, these 12 songs are evidently personal and, at times, thematically obscure.

The track list lurches, rather than blends seamlessly, and on the spacey ‘This World’ she plays with an atonal vocal line (and the admittedly great lyric “you little prick – what do you know?”) that typifies her preference for experimentalism over accessibility. Even so, Moolchan remains as singular – and sophisticated – as ever.