It all adds up to an emphatic showcase of Pond’s personality, and their ability to inflict their eccentric spirit on any genre they fancy.

Childish’s defiant presence guides.

Sunne is a grotty, grubby and exciting refining of Cheatahs' sound.

The full, colourful spectrum of Jamie is on show here, as broad as it’s ever been.

Evil Genius is a perfect distillation of his talent, and we’re unlikely to see him outdo it, but it also underlines his unique position as bonafide star and rap outsider. This may be the biggest he’s ever allowed to get.

You’ll love it, or you’ll hate it, you’ll have no idea what’s going on, but revel in the fact that a debut like this is allowed to exist.

If you’re a fan of this stuff – powerful, bruising, operatic, performed with absolutely no sense of irony whatsoever – then there’s no question that Sabaton are amongst the best of the best. ... This is the album that could take Sabaton upwards.

This album is the stylish and streetwise mash-up of genres that you’d hear on an UNKLE or Gorillaz record. It never really blasts off, but this time it’s more about the journey than how fast you get there.

More. Again. Forever strikes a mature balance. It’s escapist in its sound but humane in its approach to the world. It’s experimental but familiar, and tests what the band are capable of while proving to be their more focussed work to date.

Star-studded, shimmering, danceable and intimate, ‘A Muse In Her Feelings’ is R&B in its purest form.

Sadly the last couple of songs on ‘The Bonny’ disappointingly tail off and almost feel tagged on. Thankfully there’s more than enough on here to help us dream of better times ahead.

As well as weighty statements, there is a sense of closure here.

‘Morning Pageants’ is a thought-provoking and totally unique body of work, one that will likely continue to inspire and confound as much as its subject.

The band operate in the same art-pop playground as bands like alt-J and Field Music, with guitars popping and chiming over Andrew Thompson and Bryn Jenkins’ rhythms, only taking a moment to change the pace for tracks like ‘Out to Get You’, with its prettily plucked pastoral guitar strings and close, breathy vocals, and ‘Smorgasbord’, which makes sparing use of anguished, weeping piano notes.

This kind of bug-eyed bish-bash-bosh is exactly what we need from Frank Carter And The Rattlesnakes right now. Great records inevitably come out of shit times, and this is one of them.

This project is sure to surprise fans with its unique sensibility, further showcasing how difficult it is to constrict the artist into any specific genre. Chaz borrows multiple elements to create something wholly unique, skating through sounds to create a genre pastiche to suit every taste.

A cocky, self-assured record that blends Sports Team’s chaotic energy with a smart, heartfelt understanding of the power of guitar music.

Woven from a great many creative ideas, ‘Miss Power’ could have felt messy. But through Constance’s skilful bird’s eye view, it instead twists the key in the pandora’s box of her potential, re-introducing her unique take on the world.

The inner battles of ‘Permanent Damage’ are unflinching, and will likely stay with you long after the songs finish. It’s slightly deflating, then, that its instrumental flourishes often fade into the background, making for an album that takes risks without ever quite putting itself out there.

Poet Toi Derricotte once wrote that joy is in fact an “act of resistance”: listening to Monáe’s liberating latest album, you start to believe that pleasure is, too.

‘WEEDKILLER’ expertly weaves public and personal politics into an impressively captivating narrative for a debut.

Often catchy and always from the heart, ‘Killjoy’ is a deeply human debut. Their polished sound benefits massively from the odd punk outburst, and other parts of the album feel destined for boisterous end-of-gig singalongs.

Despite the fullness of its sound, ‘Call A Doctor’ never loses its personal touch, too. “You’ve been swell / Oh, what the hell / You’ve been dear,” closes James on ‘Outro’, bringing all this colourful melodrama to a touching end.

Leaning into catchy pop and garage rock mixed with an anecdotal edge, Bird’s debut album ‘American Hero’ has a gloss that is, undeniably, all-American.

Despite holding onto this grief, Wizkid puts that energy into more dancefloor fillers. Fun and experimental, while still harnessing an element of traditional afrobeats, the dance section of ‘Morayo’ builds on ‘More Life, Less Ego’’s high-energy yet effortless aura.

It’s the work of a group who’ve managed to grow up without losing their spark. On ‘Selling A Vibe’, the trio are still finding new ways to sound like The Cribs – and that’s a more impressive and unusual feat than it might first appear.

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.

Raw melody made Unknown Mortal Orchestra exciting two years ago; now they’ve matched it with attention to detail.