She is deliciously wry, and in the top lyrical form of her life throughout this record. ... There’s also no sense of her second-guessing what her expanded fanbase might be expecting from her sonically. This is, without question, the most musically ambitious album of her career.

R.Y.C is at its most provocative and memorable when its larger-than-life characters and productions become unhinged and combustible with lust for life. Yet Mura Masa’s anxious contemplation of modern-living – the highs, the lows, the lies we tell ourselves to make it all better – hits just as hard.

It is an astonishing record – one that continuously stops you dead in your tracks, encourages curiosity, and builds a new world for you to dive into, while connecting to the sounds of all of Rosalía’s previous releases.

As parting statements go, Post Pop Depression is solid gold proof of his genius.

Despite the daunting level of hype surrounding it, the Bath-born 20-year-old’s debut 10-track mixtape doesn’t merely justify it, but exceeds it. ... PinkPantheress unloads these breathless and adventurous songs with a winning confidence that comes only when you outperform everyone’s expectations, especially your own.

Ghosteen is one of the most devastatingly accurate accounts of grief that you’ll ever listen to. Yet it’s also, astoundingly, one of the most comforting. Few mediations on grief manage to navigate despair and catharsis as well as this.

New album Flamagra, a spaced-out funk epic that’s much more soothing than its predecessor, proves Ellison has grown as a producer.

The boundaries for African music are constantly moving, and across this album, Amaarae pushes them even further.

By blending melody, harmony and palpable atmosphere, Folk Bitch Trio have created a masterful debut that lingers long after the final notes ring out.

Again, he has made another record that will stay close to the hearts of a generation of rap fans. He is surely our generation’s Lil Wayne.

It’s the softest of her records, yet perhaps the most emotionally violent. .... If this truly is the end of her story, it’s hard to imagine a more heartfelt way to lay Ethel Cain to rest.

This record isn’t a monument to His Royal Badness. It’s one of the greatest artists of our time carrying Prince’s baton into the new world.

‘Euro-Country’ has the courage and the consistency to land high on the fast-approaching end-of-year lists, and to make CMAT the icon she’s been giving all this time.

Ultimately this record – her best yet – is about finding a different kind of love: the quiet self-examination after the dust of a break-up finally settles.

The Sheeran-featuring ‘Peru”s inclusion on the tracklist of ‘Playboy’ is a further nod to his rise. But this album more than demonstrates that its creator is no one-hit wonder.

Let England Shake is an album that only the Polly Harvey of today could have written.

A remarkable album, one that only grows more awesome with each listen.

It flows in a way that makes it a treat to enjoy from start to finish rather than dipping into songs at random. ... Thought-provoking and full of fresh new flavour.

Ultimately it’s the album’s sense of humanity, not its innate clever-cleverness, that elevates it to something special.

This new record not only keeps up that 100 per cent strike rate of golden tunes, but also gives us their best release to date. It’s an album that represents huge growth. Their vocals are more powerful and emotive than ever. ... Like true Gen Z artists, they pull from an extensive palette of genres, but manage to make each – be it angsty rock or a return to disco-pop – feel like it’s a sound they’ve been honing for ages.

Rodriguez has turned heartbreak into a glorious 30 minutes of club-ready electro-smashes. ‘I’m Your Empress Of’ is nothing short of breathtaking.

The Cribs’ best album in 11 years.

Opulence is the perfect playground for Zauner’s spiky sensibilities, an allegorical minefield for the morbidity and bloodiness of our hedonistic modern existences. No one nails that like Japanese Breakfast.

With ‘Kings Disease II’, he has delivered a masterpiece of monolithic measures, completing arguably the best two-volume series in hip-hop.

A record that, when given the requisite time and attention, offers unfathomable depths to explore.

Even if you've been fortunate enough to live with these tracks over the last year or so, they still sound more vital, more likely to make you form your own band than anything else out there.

A tempestuous record, one that stays with you longer than the rage and anguish which, here, is as fleeting, yet deeply magical, as the changing seasons.

Mournful acoustic strumming, slide guitar, hushed percussion, strung-out woozy piano – there’s consistency and clarity to ‘Curve Of Earth’; perhaps more than you’d expect of a record 15 years in the making. What this album does, though, is contain the chaos of addiction, crystallising mistakes into something much more beautiful. The result is extraordinary and life-affirming.