Scraping off the garage 
rock grit and disjointed sharp edges that characterised his 
previous album ‘Emotional Mugger’ for this definitive self-portrait, Segall scrubs 
up great.

British hip-hop finally got serious--and Loyle Carner is leading the charge.

Don’t come to Modern Ruin looking to be cheered up then, but if it’s catharsis you’re after, there’s nothing more fitting.

Hang is propelled by two principal forces--star-quality musicianship and the will to trespass beyond tradition. And, crucially, at a third of the size 
of its predecessor, it allows 
Rado and France--who wrote and produced every song--to fully focus. Rado’s keys are particularly outstanding.

Like cold, clean water, Austra’s Future Politics washes clear the mental muck, leaving you feeling alive again.

With features from current genre dons Devlin, JME, Frisco, Flowdan and, of course, Skepta, it feels like a celebration of all grime achieved in 2016.

Oczy Mlody is the sonic equivalent of a deserted space-ship adrift in the cosmos, with Coyne as the lonely repair-bot dusting the diodes. A psych rock Passengers, then, rather than Barbarella.

A timeless creation, the record’s nine carefully crafted tracks draw gracefully on the past 50 years of folk music.

There’s tonnes of fun to be had from absorbing the duo’s fury, and El-P’s sci-fi beats are as thrillingly big ‘n’ bad as ever.

They find a balance with the old xx though. Fragility and self-doubt are still themes. Indeed, the highlight is Romy’s pensive, vulnerable ballad ‘Performance’.

It’s evident the band have begun a new chapter where they appreciate rather than become their influences. They’ve truly 
arrived.

By going back to the music that producer Don Was calls the “fountainhead of everything they do”, however, they sound younger than they have in decades. Blue & Lonesome is proof that old dogs don’t always have need of new tricks.

Few albums designed to sound like a party actually play like one, but Bruno Mars has pulled it off with style.

It sounds like a long-overdue coming-of-age. It’s never been easy being a fan of Doherty, but it’s certainly getting more rewarding.

If there’s a problem here, it’s the obvious 2016 one: length.

Dense, detailed and idiosyncratic, Redemption doesn’t slot in neatly next to the tropical beats and minimal pop hits that are currently dominating the charts. But there will always be a place for music as rich as this that dares to be a little different.

Bayston’s brilliant at producing these repetitive but nuanced melodies, most of which knot themselves inside your brain and won’t let go.

Woman is a joyous album of hope and optimism.

While Hardwired... To Self-Destruct isn’t dissimilar in delivery to their last record, 2008’s ‘Death Magnetic’, Metallica still--in their fifties--remain both vital and innovative.

With Here, it feels as though she’s dug deep to produce a set of genuine, heartfelt and relevant anthems.

It’s all deranged enough to convince us that Sleigh Bells are still menacing outliers, but on a deep cover mission to infiltrate the mainstream, horns still poking out of their ’80s mullet wigs.

Shinier and poppier than anything Speedy Ortiz have done, Slugger is Dupuis’ attempt at putting politics into pop. The results are a thrilling and fizzing triumph.

Sandé clearly has the chops to stand out in the sophisticated cross-platform arms race of modern pop music--the soaring ‘Shakes’ and ‘Sweet Architect’ are proof of that--but you still wish she didn’t fall back so readily on cliché.

There’s still no other British pop star quite as entertaining and unpredictable.

Follow-up Ready For The Magic is just as angry and their sometimes gauzy alt-rock is beefed up to ferocious levels.

‘Unnatural’ is full of sexy, snarling swagger and ‘Walls’ zips by on a wave of thundering riffs. Elsewhere there are hints of industrial (‘Money Machine’) and even reggae (‘Slow Down’), all proving that Nick Valensi has plenty of ideas and invention to offer outside of The Strokes.

Some listeners may not warm to Lo’s persona, but her songwriting skills are difficult to fault (she’s also co-written hits for Ellie Goulding and Girls Aloud on the side). Aided by collaborators including Lorde producer Joel Little and Max Martin’s protégé Ilya Salmanzadeh, she keeps the hooks coming throughout.

But more than anything else, Soft Hair is about intimacy, creativity and a zest for life--two singular musicians liberated by collaboration.