It’s the sound of a former trendsetter, settled happily into adulthood, doing his own thing, following his muse, comfortable in his skin. It’s a pleasure to hear.

Often ‘Saves the World’ is brutal in its specificity – with devastating effects.

‘Free’ is a liberating collection that unshackles the star from his past and his insecurities, and slowly cracks open a door to version of the future that will inevitably arrive when he’s ready. Wherever that journey takes him in this phase of his career, it’ll be an honour to witness.

Here, on her most consistent work to date, she’s still dramatic, seductive and theatrical, but fully cut loose. This is Khan’s own heroic moment.

It’s the ‘meh’ shruggable moments of filler around them that dog the consistency of ‘Wallop’. There’s not the high-octane fuel or direction to take the record to the heights that it so constantly teases.

It’s a slow-burnin’ collection that’s certainly less immediate than their debut, and often feels like a retread instead of a progression. But that doesn’t make songs like ‘Friend of Mine’ and ‘Song For Ty’ any less enjoyable, as Elrich’s and Kazacek’s songwriting bond appears stronger than ever.

It’s not as if Kano’s position as one of the Top Boys of an energised UK grime and rap scene needed any further cementing, though ‘Hoodies All Summer’ has done exactly that.

Lana Del Rey is large – she contains multitudes, and the way she balances and embodies them on her fifth album is nothing short of stunning.

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.

It’s no reinvention, but there are subtle tweaks here and there for a polished record that cements their place as a kick-ass rock’n’roll band with longevity.

This fuzzy, muddy record splits the difference between the bubblegum pop-punk of Furman’s earlier albums, such as 2015’s ‘Perpetual Motion People’, and the more unknowable ‘Transangelic Exodus’.

All in all, ‘ICONOLOGY’ is Missy putting a gun in the face of her haters and daring them to say something. She wants them to doubt her just so she can pop off with some zany game-changing vision that’ll set the world on fire. But she’s not ready to unload a full clip just yet. Rest assured, though – it’s coming.

There are plenty of hooks here, but nothing to make a festival tent bounce like ‘Boogie’ or ‘Gold’ can. It’s a small criticism, though, on an album that resets Brockhampton’s compass and sees them straying away from the danger of implosion that ‘Iridescence’ seemed to suggest.

At 18 tracks long, ‘Lover’ is more sprawling and further from flawless than her 2014 pop crossover ‘1989’. But it succeeds in spite of its clunkier moments because Swift’s melodies are frequently dazzling and her loved-up lyrics are ultimately quite touching.

As with releases previous, there are wrinkles that will only emerge after the record is lived with and absorbed. But if you’re wondering whether ‘Fear Inoculum’ was worth the wait, then the answer is yes. If you’re wondering whether it’ll touch your heart, soul and spirt, the answer is also so.

This experimental concoction Redd delivered is a hit-or-miss.

Things do pick up with messy, closing tracks ‘Self-Immolate’ and ‘Hell’, but these are proficient rather than remarkable moments. Ultimately, it’s not enough to prevent ‘Infest The Rats’ Nest’ from feeling like a case of “look what we can do!” rather than a record fully realised.

By removing the safety net of her debut and baring herself both musically and lyrically on album two, Jay Som has not only become a better songwriter, but now feels like an important one too. The messages on ‘Anak Ko’ are worth lending a close ear to.

So Much Fun is a free-spirited record that comes with heavy doses of ridiculousness, but it’s lovably silly, and is a welcome dose of light relief.

It does little to either push Turner forward or tell these stories satisfactorily.

Friendly Fires remain knowingly cheesy and in-your-face and their Technicolor live shows will continue to thrill regardless. The worst part of ‘Inflorescent’ is that you won’t hate it; you’ll just forget you’ve even listened to it.

A record that beautifully articulates the giddiness of love, ‘Forevher’ subtly queers up the love song in its most timeless form.

As ever, The Hold Steady achieve their best work when their playing is loose. When the songs are filtered through the bottom of a shot glass. When they sound like the best bar band in the best bar you didn’t know about until the moment that you found yourself in it at 3am in the morning. On the basis of ‘Thrashing Thru The Passion’, that band are back.

Propelled by sharp, angular sounds, ‘The Center Won’t Hold’ craves connection above everything else in a world that can often seem desperately lonely. Each dirty and distorted throb (unlocked to full potential by Annie Clark’s gift for making guitars sound positively devilish) seems to yearn for another body to hold onto.

The past eight years have seen Blanck Mass creep forwards to slowly become one of the UK’s most exciting experimental producers. Animated Violence Mild is the pay-off, a fantastic, delirious soundtrack to our demise.

There’s plenty of furious bluster on the record – vocalist James McGovern sounds incensed on ‘More Is Less’, and ‘Feeling Fades’ remains a razor-sharp torrent of feeling – but maybe its most interesting moments come in the slow-burns.

While the beginning of the album struggles, you’ll be hard pushed to find a five-song stretch as flawless as the close out tracks on Ross’ 10th studio album.

The Oxford band’s second album since their 2014 reformation benefits from a wealth of creativity and experimentation that Bell may well have been suppressing for over 20 years.