The result are a joy, exuding the same casual charm that has always characterised his best work. [Sep 2008]

Desperation proves that only modest mellowing has taken place in the interim. [Aug 2013, p.103]

By absorbing some of the best bits of The Beach Boys, Super Furry Animals and, at times, Dexy's Midnight Runners, Gorky's Zygotic Mynci have made the perfect album for a breezy, summer afternoon.

There's a thin line between quirky powerpop and being They Might Be Giants. [Feb 2004, p.106]

Melody rarely comes easily, but this is a flamboyantly musical record that creates the perfect backdrop for Cave's theological, metaphysical musings.

Like its predecessor, In The Mode is a sprawling tour-de-force, and its 80 minutes contain much that is breathtaking alongside the pleasant if perfunctory. [Nov 2000, p. 112]

These songs snap at the outer edges of country, blues and folk, their emotional turmoil leavened by moments of bone-dry humour. [Nov 2000, p.107]

It's 20-minute closer Unrelenting Unconditional, however, which steals the show with its spectacular reimagining of Miles Davis's epic early '70s experiments in transcendental jazz-funk. [Apr 2015, p.108]

While generational ennui smoulders in the lyrics, their main concern remains heartbreak and its vicissitudes. [Dec 2017, p.106]

This is music that's lived life and doesn't stay in the same spot for long. It's a revelation. [Feb 2019, p.109]

A live document of his wildly acclaimed 2008 tour, Glitter And Doom further amplifies that uniqueness, backed up by an entire second disc of surreal storytelling. [Jan 2010, p. 126]

The mood of their music often feels a little stuck, though. [Oct 2012, p.100]

This is an almanac for the chronically inert, best when bottling the sparks that fly as misery meets fine company. [Dec 2017, p.111]

While preachiness rarely flatters battle-trained MCs, roller-coaster wordplay here makes the 34-year-old's sermons fun to untangle, even on harrowing subjects. [Oct 2019, p.107]

It's Prince, it's Eno, it's PiL, it's The Coasters and all at once. At times, that jars. At others... it's as exhilarating as a kiss. [Jul 2004, p.124]

Inevitably there are moments that would benefit from smoothing out, but part of the appeal is getting to ample Giannascoli's talent when it's still raw. [Dec 2014, p.110]

All 10 songs yield more delights with every hearing. [May 2003, p.112]

Not so much a wholesale reinvention as an impressive readjustment. [Feb 2018, p.112]

While the guest MCs provide the better-known names (Ghetts, Kojey Radical), it is the singers who make this such a special album. [Mar 2019, p.120]

The beautiful lap steel and accordion arrangement of Beneath The Rose, majestic duet I Still Remember and lilting waltz Stand In My Way only make the roaring violence of On My Way more startling. [Sep 2004, p.126]

Without enough killer hooks Leo seems unlikely to claw his way much beyond cult attraction. [Mar 2005, p.100]

He's shot truer and more heartfelt arrows than these. [Jul 2004, p.122]

Each of Stray's tracks bring with it a sense of foreboding, from the eerie short-story-style lyrics to the reveryb-y guitars, which land between Echo & The Bunnymen and Ennio Morricone. [Apr 2020, p.105]

The result is something of a left-field classic. [Nov 2008, p.114]

In the end, the try-everything approach works out: if only because Girls' scatterbrained classic rock patchwork is so idiosyncratically odd. [Oct 2011, p.124]

They've never sounded heavier, now delivering songs without compromising their complex songcraft. [Apr 2914, p.103]

The hit rate's impressive. [Oct 2016, p.109]

Highlights here include the disorientated '60s pop of I Can Recall It All and the snappy, Troggs-like title track. [Oct 2019, p.106]

[A] brilliantly unsettling album. [Apr 2016, p.110]

The overall effect is not dissimilar to Sugababes, only with added adult content. [Aug 2006, p.111]

In the comparatively safe musical surrounds of 2005, he stands out as a compelling and utterly unique artist. [Oct 2005, p.119]

It's one which adds up to more than the sum of its parts. [Apr 2017, p.114]

Reflections proves Diamond is so much more than a two-dimensional pop project. [Jan 2020, p.111]

Redoubled his grime values: scene loyalty via scathing wit and wildly entertaining chutzpah. [Aug 2020, p.104]

Like Solomon Burke and Johnny Cash before her, she's turned to the likes of Will Oldham, Dolly Parton and Merle Haggard for source material, and turns in an album of love, pain, suffering and redemption to rival any of them. [May 2006, p.130]

[The band] hasn't compromised the pitiless bleakness of Scott Hutchison's lyrical vision from their previous output. [Mar 2013, p.99]

The fifth album from New Jersey's The Dillinger Escape Plan is another step back towards the math-metal that made their name. [Jul 2013, p.103]

At 22 tracks - including a spoken interlude by Eminem - there's a lot to digest here. But, Crucially, a lot worth digesting. [Mar 2020, p.120]

For the first time in their 19-year career, Pearl Jam actually sound--whisper it--fun. [Oct 2009, p.119]

It was a smart move [to enlist Tim,] Goldsworthy's attention to detail forcing the band up a gear. [July 2008, p.101]

[The album blurs] genres with the same ease it blurs expectations. [Oct 2013, p.109]

The effect is brilliantly female and forceful. [Nov 2015, p.115]

While unpredictable in parts, there are great melodies here to pull the floating voters in. [Oct 2016, p.106]

It's a record that turned out exactly as Hutchison intended. [Aug 2019, p.111]

The fierce intensity of Ote's digital blurts, Mudafossil's amorphous throb and To Many's fractal melodies show Kooshanejad mapping fascinating new dimensions of his own. [May 2016, p.111]

The highlights are outweighed by tracks such as Glitter Gold Year, a half-formed sketch of jabbing bass and meandering riffs. [Jan. 2012 p. 120]

This is witty English guitar rock of the highest calibre. [Nov 2002, p.114]

This genuinely feels like a fresh start rather than time-killing. [Mar 2003, p.100]

For all its feverish bluster, this... is patchy at best. [Sep 2003, p.102]

There is plenty to enjoy, although it never comes close to recapturing the eclectic brillance of 1999's career high, "69 Love Songs. [Feb 2008, p.99]

Intricate guitar lines twine tightly and Josh Block's hyperactive drumming keeps the whole rickety enterprise a hair's breadth shy of total collapse. [Jul 2011, p.121]

More expansive, darker and that much more intriguing. [Feb 2020, p.109]

Fittingly complex. [Summer 2020, p.107]

Jurado has an eagerness to experiment and independence of thought that spills into his characters, and it's very good look on them all. [Feb 2014, p.116]

Although his monotone becomes a little wearing over an entire album, this is still his best work in a long time. [Oct 2012, p.106]

It occasionally delivers the eccentric, giant-chorused rock that made Faith No More so great. [Feb 2013, p.107]

While not exactly rammed with chart-friendly bangers, the likes of Oino's Day-Glo twitch and Mountain's doe-eyed dream pop should hopefully ensure Dust the success that eluded him first time around. [Jul 2015, p.108]

Free from any external pressure to conform, Hebden has managed to make a wholly uncompromising record that remains compulsive from start to finish. [Dec 2013, p.115]

A starkly modern folk record centered on a narrative of a mother leaving her family. [Jul 2018, p.114]

They stand up to modern scrutiny. [Apr 2020, p.118]

Radiates good feeling and warmth. [Nov 2005, p.131]

It's wall-of-noise stuff, but consistently they manage to either build a decent tune into the squall or else engage the listener through exhilarating power alone. [Nov. 2009, p.101]

Occasionally there's a little too much going on... Overall, though, Gartside remains intriguing. [Jul 2006, p.116]

EarthEE finds that magic spot where the feet are grounded but the head's floating on a cloud. [Apr 2015, p.111]

The two have a great dynamic--potentially even a special one--its just not fully realised here. [Jun 2016, p.108]

Universal themes absorbs and moves far more than it frustrates. [Aug 2015, p.113]

It's pretty good. Production values have been upped in the intervening period but rather than smooth out their edges, they only serve to accentuate their fierce, angular approach. [Aug 2015, p.110]

Lush and lyrical, Jones makes 2013 a year to remember. [Apr 2016, p.108]

These are deftly executed songs that regularly throw out unexpected curveballs within their Gorky's Zygotic Mynci-like bounce. [Sep 2017, p.109]

The connective sense of an on-the-hoof holiday from the day job, plus emotionally deep and humorous lyrics, make this a winner. [Summer 2020, p.98]

Nostalchic is texturally dense, yes, but made of simply swoonsome stuff. [Apr 2013, p.104]

It's by no means a classic but there's enough personality to suggest Hozier will be with us for the long haul. [Oct 2014, p.110]

On this excellent record, she maps a route forward. [Jun 2019, p.109]

What's lacking from the Oakland native is the kind of fresh approach to a retro sound that elevated Amy Winehouse above straight homage. [Apr 2009, p.110]

it ens up a tie between waffling self-indulgence and occasional moments of inspiration. Definitely not predictable, though. [Apr 2011, p.110]

The swagger of Marshall's lyrics indicate a musician luxuriating in her maturity. [Nov 2018, p.105]

The sonic scope here is far wider, incorporating both industrial and squawking jazz into something that chimes perfectly with uncertain times. [Jun 2020, p.106]

A lot of the goofy teenage kicks have been replaced with more tiresome sex raps. [Sep 2005, p.115]

Potent, and strangely noble. [Nov 2009, p.112]

Worth every second of the wait. [Oct 2015, p.108]

There's the brisk cover of Sparks's 'Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth,' plus a huanting, piano-inspired run through Harry Nilsson's drunkathon 'Don't Forget Me,' but she blows it at the death with the hideous 'Marais La Nuit,' 31 torturous minutes 38 grisly seconds of forest noises. [Apr 2009, p.102]

The naysayer might dismiss it as an elaborate pastiche, but this would be to miss the point of an often intoxicating LP that's more than the sum of its parts. [Jul 2013, p.108]

First Taste is a record exploding with ideas and interesting twists. [Sep 2019, p.109]

Forget diminishing returns, The Something Rain keeps Tindersticks' value high. [April 2012, p.105]

Out of step with the modern world. [Sep 2006, p.108]

Maybe it's simpy the case that, Cash and Rubin having done similar things together so often in the past, the magic and power ro move have worn off, only to be replaced by an uneasy feeling of exploitation. [Apr 2010, p.108]

Music that sounds completely out of time, made by an often incredible string band. [Sep 2006, p.108]

It has the messy, majestic sprawl of classic Crazy Horse. [Dec 2012, p.115]

Like a technology-phobic Beck, Desser tells his off-kilter tales with a wry eye. [Sep 2004, p.119]

Pitched somewhere between Lauryn Hill and Alanis Morissette, Furtado's songs - sung nasally in a style which occasionally recalls a less hysterical Gwen Stefani - are playful, unaffected and full of little surprises.

Sixty minutes long -- the album's subtitle is "A Musical Curriculum" -- this is pure, hip-hop-based sampledelica and anything but po-faced.

While rough and a little patchy, it's a cracking debut nonetheless. [Aug 2003, p.108]

With each release, they tweak and slightly reinvent their wheel--and use it, happily, to keep on trucking. [Jun 2005, p.112]

So convincing does the Boston-based siren inhabit this cut-off, gothic world that it's hard not to be sucked inside the darkly compelling likes of 'River Of Dirt.' [Apr 2009, p.107]

A downright joyous debut. [Feb. 2012 p. 101]

It's quite brilliant. [Jan 2012, p.124]

This is direct, explosive and packed with big choruses. [May 2013, p.99]

This Best-Of encapsulates a remarkable career built on fearsome imagination and creativity. [Apr 2014, p.123]