Kelly shows how easy it is to keep it simple, melodious and un-synthesised; and on these occasions, Kelly's lyrics come to the fore.... when he shelves his obsession with opening your legs and opens his mind, that he is capable of making thought-provoking material.

A rather mousey, introspective record, awash with the wishy-washy sounds of shoegazing, and yet not without its precise, audacious moments.

It's best treated as a curio in the Smashing Pumpkins' legacy; and for those who grew up on 'Today', '1979' and 'Ava Adore', you're better left with your memories.

This collaboration-heavy eighth album tends to fail when it experiments.

It's a great shame that this album's component parts don't raise the whole above 'nice to know they're still around' status.

Does a new generation of music lovers really need a third solo album from [Malkmus] which includes songs that house guitar wig-outs and last up to eight minutes? Not really. [28 May 2005, p.64]

The Uglysuit, whose country-prog-post-rock-indie-orchestral ramblings recall, variously, Wilco, Bright Eyes, The Shins, Elbow, Ryan Adams, My Morning Jacket and the soundtrack for every emotionally self-indulgent US drama ever made. Yet, hearing the warm country musings of ‘Chicago’ or the aching two-note piano motif of 'And We Became Sunshine’, it’s hard not to settle into the seduction.

Perhaps it was the pressure of following breakthrough hit ‘C’mon C’mon’, or some serious Jack White payback voodoo, but now, where should have roared a gutsy, triumphant comeback squeaks a patchy, mediocre-in-places record.

On their third album, the trio largely abandon the Latin influences of earlier outings for a medium-haul flight back to the more two-dimensional sounds of Canadian indie-rock.

What's missing is any emotional contrast to stop all that cleverness from sounding overwhelming.

[Their] penchant for pastiche has evolved... into full-blown plagiarism. [9 Oct 2004, p.57]

The LP toes a line between eclecticism and kitchen sink, but the one thing he hasn't chucked in here is a little focus.

Her voice--treated and autotuned to within an inch of its life throughout--still sounds like that of the Mouseketeer who brought us '...Baby One More Time’, with every breathy “Mmmm… yeah!” and all the oh-so-naughty lyrics, such as the ones above, sounding forced and unconvincing. Of course, on a large number of the tracks here she has the solidly cool-sounding (no doubt expensive) backdrop of futur’n’b pop.

Konk is the sound of a band in disarray, unsuccessfully attempting to hold things together.

It is a one-trick album and they spunk away their best song, the incantatory ‘Shame On The Soul’, right at the start, but the aforementioned trick is, at least, an affecting, and very occasionally gorgeous, one.

It remains a 1980s Johnny Cash album and it wasn’t until Rick Rubin got hold of him 10 years later that he came in from the cold.

While there are blips in all areas of life - the possible existence of Bigfoot, the rich and strange wildlife of Madagascar - few things cast more suspicion upon the whole survival-of-fittest concept than the continuing career of Everclear.

With a bit of luck, Broken Records won’t be afraid to indulge themselves a little more in the future, because it would be a minor tragedy to see such a worldly band opt to wallow in mediocrity

The problem is simply the songs: route-one, four-chord grunge adrenaline hits that have none of the haunting and eerie dissonance that set them apart from bands like Wavves, and the rest of US indie’s surplus of breezy slacker-rockers last time around.

Bragg and The Blokes' delivery sounds just as dated as the social traditions they lampoon.

Ultimately, Rebel Heart feels like a wasted opportunity.

The very fact long-time collaborator Rick Rubin is at the helm is proof enough that while the production is mostly immaculate, I'm With You is an exercise in how a multi-million selling rock behemoth plays it safe.

Psychedelic craziness. [30 Apr 2005, p.64]

He barely has to try and, to be honest, here it shows.

The frame is there, there's just not enough meat on the muscles of their Euro-jitter-pop.

The actual music on this album is excellent--the sort of Canadian indie beloved of people who live in cities yet dress like the Unabomber....A hole is kicked in the side of it by Carey Mercer’s berserk singing however.

Excuse me sir, is this 1993? [26 Aug 2006, p.43]

Truly this is music for life's uncomplicated moments. [15 Jul 2006, p.39]