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.

No Way Down’s panpipes and ‘Windmill Wedding’s' outro menagerie racket are so gap-year utopian they make you want to ram joss sticks up Air France’s noses. Mighty peculiar.

This is a brilliant album that will no doubt top some ‘best of 2008’ lists, but it’s hard to work out if it’s a one-off or not.

Duffy’s debut is hoovered of personality, principally, because on this evidence, she hasn’t got any.

Just because Brain Thrust Mastery doesn’t attempt to shoehorn some hamfisted social commentary or poverty-ending rhetoric into its 11 tracks doesn’t make it lightweight indie fluff; far from it–-We Are Scientists are serious about having fun.

Merging aquatic Americana that casts its net over the gang mentality of Arcade Fire, The Polyphonic Spree and Broken Social Scene – and that most über-overexposed of F-words, folk – it’s clear why Johnny Marr is touting the Californian throng as his new favourite band.

Despite the occasional flashes of brightness, it sounds like they’ve taken that brief (an homage to the mundanities of love) to heart.

The Last Shadow Puppets is an awesome achievement--a modern reinvigoration of an archaic, dead musical language.

'Trust Me’ works, kinda, by doing R&B without palely imitating US fare: take ‘Hot Stuff’, smooth ’80s dance-pop that makes game use of Bowie’s ‘Let’s Dance’.

Despite No Age’s enforced restrictions, they’ve come up with an album that--in its urgent, accidental variety--is far more exciting than the studied stylistic uniformity of most rock bands’ efforts.

John & Jehn probably imagine themselves as Serge Gainsbourg’s Bonnie And Clyde, when in reality they’re more like the indie-goth Richard & Judy.

That it’s Portishead’s best album yet is little short of miraculous.

Her UK debut album manages to piece together many of the elements of her chameleon-like career (Robyn is essentially a Best Of collection) and come up with what is the most inventive pop album you’ll hear all year.

So yes, a solid enough album by the standards of most pop tarts, but from the mistress of innovation? Pretty mediocre.

An eclectic album for Right Now, which shows what it means to be a modern pop star, and reveals a glittery crazy-paved path towards a brave new musical future.

If they want to be treated like adults they’ll have to release something, y’know, gooder.

The Seldom Seen Kid is a stunning record, a career-best from a band whose consistency has seldom been matched by any British indie band this decade.

This album may be svelte, but it’s far from slight.

Somehow, even after you know all the punchlines, the tunes are solid enough to still bear pressing ‘repeat’.

A strident, self-assured album.

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

That this debut tries for so much and almost achieves it all is to be applauded. However, in trying to run before they can walk, DIOYY have missed out on making the classic this could have been.

The hardcore will find ‘Live In Liverpool’ too light while new converts would be better off delving into the treasure trove of old albums.

Even if Prince, Madonna, Paul Weller, Shane MacGowan, Ice-T and Michael Jackson got together to form a freakish supergroup, they’d struggle to make an album containing as much vitality, humour and invention as Cave and his wizened cronies have.

Mountain Battles is both a joyfully lived-in and boundary-free album.

Their debut sounds sleek and exhilarating, although Foals seem cautious about completely breaking out of the punk-funk strictures that have confined them so far.

St Jude is conclusive proof they have far more interesting things to say when they let the tunes do the talking.

It is, however, undoubtedly a collection of many good songs. From start to finish, it’s a relentlessly difficult listen, and one that suffers from little in the way of dynamics or variety of tone.