You are, unfortunately, left wondering how the 26-year-old Dylan would have sung them. [Dec 2014, p.113]

Core members Jonathan Donahue and Sean "Grasshopper" Mackowiak render sadness in twinkling matinee orchestrations, Central Park East or Coming Up For Air sounding pillowy, expansive, there to cushion a fall. [Oct 2015, p.111]

The world isn't short of observational singer-songwriters, but when the work is of this calibre it's pretty hard to resist. [Aug 2020, p.107]

Its gorgeousness isn't always matched by a real statement of intent. [Summer 2019, p.112]

They're all set to limber pop that draws on the more understated aspects of both indie rock and dance, with Li's one-off personality a delight throughout. [July 2008, p.107]

Outside Love presents a collection of dramatic, heart-on-sleeve love songs. [Jun 2009, p.130]

Brains and beauty come from the Chicagoan cult-rockers. [July 2011, p. 119]

Lunacy has seldom sounded more exhilarating. [Aug 2005, p.126]

Drone metal linchpin, with guest Kurt Cobain. [Jan. 2011, p. 150]

It's one of the best things Childs has ever done. [Dec 2013, p.104]

A wonderful album that exists in its own little world. [#361, p.112]

A couple of other tracks veer too close to pastiche, but taken as a whole, this is a rich, brave, eloquent piece of work. [Sep 2019, p.108]

If his production has lost a little funkiness it's gained buckets of emotive power. [Aug 2013, p.100]

Sex & Food is more grounded, focusing on such concerns as the state of the world. Yet it's all wrapped in warped, layered music as complex as the mess we're in. [May 2018, p.114]

A laid-back affair clouded with melancholy. [Sep 2006, p.109]

Forever Turned Around shares the warm textures that made its predecessor so endearing, but finds the band's fortunes looking up. [Oct 2019, p.114]

What sounds difficult at first unfurls with force over repeated listens, veering from the chant-driven 'Molalatladi' to 'Lakeside's' space rock reverie. [Oct 2009, p.108]

Crosseyed Heart sounds fantastic and beautifully put together. [Oct 2015, p.110]

The characters and stories that Oberst sketches out have never been so fully realised. [Jul 2014, p.112]

British rapper ups the stakes with boundary-stretching pop turn. [Oct 2011, p.94]

He makes a quantum leap forward on his new album. [May 2011, p.112]

A tightly constructed record, its hushed instrumentation and Southern Gothic lyrics give it a melancholic mood, one that Bondy handles beautifully. [Dec 2009, p. 117]

So intimate and sad you can almost see the candles flickering. [Mar 2004, p.110]

[Control] finds Bazan wearily retreading themese of religion and relationships. [May 2002, p.119]

The glacial tones and chimes that the Velvet Underground modelled on Sunday Morning are invoked once too often. But, beyond this, Sandoval's sedated, spellbound voice remains a remarkable presence. [Nov 2001]

Either Yorke’s lyrics are better this time, or the comparative voluptuousness of the vocal performances make it easier to tune in, or we’ve finally grasped what he’s been getting at since abandoning OK Computer’s more straightforward man-vs-society musings.

Music that makes you 10 percent sleazier than you were--now where's that dancefloor? [Jul 2004, p.110]

Despite the embarrassment of riches, though, there's also a lot of plain old embarrassment. [May 2016, p.110]

Succeeds in sounding exotic. [Jun 2006, p.115]

[Secret Machines] have pruned back the vast sonic expanses of 2004's full-length debut album, focusing instead on brevity and melody. [Apr 2006, p.120]

He resurfaes as a country-tinged singer-songwriter of poise and substance. [#361, p.108]

Hynes can't resist tinkering with the formula and a pair of incongruous rap cameos disrupt a sketchy second half during which the feeling develops that Hynes is still holding back some of his best ideas for stars of a greater magnitude than himself. [Jan 2014, p.118]

The loose-limbed beats, fuzzy keyboards and faraway trumpet on Which One Of You Jerks Drank My Arnold Palmer? are loungecore at its best, while The Daily Routine's distortion is full of atmosphere. [Feb 2010, p. 103]

There's enough flickers of former greatness within to be glad he's stil there. [Dec 2007, p.120]

A true coming together. [Mar 2018, p.113]

A highly original two-disc set that as precious as it sounds, adpats poems from such diverse sources as ee cummings ans Gerald Manley Hopkins. [May 2010, p.124]

Mostly the results are pleasingly wry and wise. [Sep 2005, p.118]

She's still in her element luxuriating in that crisis point where comfort is soured by paranoia. ... Relative stability suits her just fine. [Nov 2019, p.112]

Insane, extraordinary. [Mar 2005, p.95]

There was always more going on inside that pretty head than met the eye. On his first release since disbanding My Chemical Romance, you may struggle to hear what that is. [Nov 2014, p.120]

The whole, though, is surprisingly cohesive and always uplifting, linked by knowingly sultry vocals and veteran innovator Bill Frisell's typically oddball guitar work. [Apr 2016, p.114]

Stuart Murdoch's lyrical muse is a touch subdued but Come On Sister's moreish synth-pop and the gleeful bubblegum, of Stevie Jackson's I'm Not Living In The Real World prove their sense of indie wonder remains undimmed. [Nov 2010, p.114]

Magnificent Fiend recycles a lot of hairy late-'60s/early '70s rock moves. [June 2008, p.149]

It's the curveballs, rather than the reliable Lanaganisms that make Blues Funeral such a powerul return. [Mar 2012, p.101]

If his vocals sound phoned in on those, when he does engage, his half-spoken, half-threatening drawl on the homesick America! and Universal Applicant evokes Gil Scott-Heron, but it;'s not enough. [May 2011, p.112]

The nostalgia would be overwhelming were it not for Bayley's ability to offset it with woozy, elastic beats. [Aug 2020, p.102]

Somewhat laid-back for a record made by an ex-punk, even one in his mid-50s. [Apr 2013, p.96]

Impressively, she pulls off both sympathy and empathy. [Oct 2008, p.138]

All [the tracks] are powerfully intimate. [Aug 2006, p.114]

Its highlights pick up where the EP left off, the likes of Bad Friend and 4AM fizzing with energy and seemingly perpetually on the brink of collapsing into thrilling chaos. They're less sure-footed when they try to broaden their palette, however. [Mar 2019, p.118]

This debut full-length channels abrasive energy akin to early SoundCloud rap. [Summer 2016, p.111]

[The album] is in turns seething and sweet. [Nov 2014, p.115]

Owens is still lyrically overblown and adolescent with his themes, but his band have found a way to make their progressive intentions fit their punk rock. [Jul 2014, p.104]

Ward continues to set a standard few other artists can match. [Jun 2020, p.106]

There are curveballs along the way--an unexpected bagpipe riff on Hey Ma, for instance--but largely this is a fast, furious record that sounds startlingly vital in these worrisome times. [Aug 2019, p.116]

It's an occasional return to their punk roots, more often smoothed over by the glistening pop production they've been known for more recently. [Nov 2019, p.116]

It's their artless harmonies and feel for rhythmic space that lift the songs to another level. [Aug 2017, p.107]

Refreshingly free of focus-grouped compromises, Sucker is certainly full of character. It's just that the character is a cartoon. [Feb 2015, p.114]

The follow-up to 1997's Lipslide proves worth the wait. [Jul 2015, p.104]

It's an album that makes you feel the real Florence Welch is only beginning. [Aug 2018, p.106]

Move over, Devendra Banhart: there's a new bunch of bohemian music kooks in town. [Apr 2008, p.115]

It's often bleak fare, but it's also compulsive stuff. [Jan 2008, p.105]

Exuberant party-banging love songs. [Sep 2015, p.116]

Jewellery is an extraordinary introduction to a unique talent. [Mar 2009, p.101]

It's like 10 years of treading water never happened. [Jun 2006, p.118]

Kwaito beats and highlife guitars mesh with hip hop and dubstep, while love songs crash into mordant political satire. [May 2012, p.102]

A tad more focus and she'll be there. [April 2012, p.102]

Almost classic Green. [Jan 2004, p.114]

Features typically fragile thumbnail sketches like New Haven Comet. [Feb 2003, p.105]

Fine for a happy hour of poppy abstraction, but you may find it tough remembering much of it afterwards. [Jul 2004, p.113]

It's a hypnotic mid-paced but hard-sounding beast which yields more with each play. [June 2002, p.112]

It's too easy to mistake them for any number of other bands--Editors, Maximo Park, The Futureheads all spring to mind--but if it's not original, it's still done weell. [Jun 2009, p.125]

This still shows renewed ambition, broadening the cool, Eno-inspired palette of his previous work. [Jun 2009, p.124]

Before The Frost... is as comfortingly familiar as one of Chris Robinson's kaftans. [Oct 2009, p.108]

Interplay sees him continuing the retro-futurist experiment. [Apr 2011, p.102]

All 14 tracks here use Yeats's verse, and while it's a natural fit, occasionally, as on The Song Of Wandering Aengus, Scott's over-enunciation can overwhelm. [Oct 2011, p.130]

Glistening, handcrafted pop. [April 2012, p.106]

An enchanting snippet of life in the left-field. [May 2012, p.106]

Part cipher, part siren, Minogue's odd power is underlined: it's not always clear quite what she does, but she does it brilliantly. [Aug 2012, p.115]

When they really hit their Ultravoxian stride on Clipped Wings or the piano breaks through the wall of synthesizer on Migrating Clay Pigeon, they're really quite spectacular. [Jul 2012, p.107]

Shocking, in the best sense. [May 2013, p.99]

Marchant is at his best on the more forceful material. [Aug 2013, p.99]

The third album since the band's 2007's reunion is low on overt politics, but high on autumnal jazz, Bacharach-ian swing, easy-going funk and relaxed charm. [Jun 2013, p.93]

Cole's beats may differ but she speaks the same language of shadows and longing. [Sep 2013, p.100]

Both sides [metal and pop] work well individually, but bolted together it sounds confused. [Sep 2013, p.100]

Not for the faint-hearted, Kilo packs a bracing, powerful punch. [Jun 2013, p.108]

A welcome return for a long-lost treasure. [Apr 2014, p.116]

It's not particularly pretty in places, but it is a hellishly good time. [Apr 2014, p.110]

With sympathetic production by reggae stalwart Mike "Prince Fatty" Pelanconi, the results combine Janet Kaye's lovers rock, the Wailers' pop years and the sound of Compass Point studios. [Jun 2014, p.107]

As ever there are reservations about Molinari's blase attitude to the second-hand song title, but it's still a solid, engaging set. [Jul 2014, p.111]

Oddly enjoyable. [Dec 2014, p.110]

[The songs] slow drift proves compelling, in a faintly Virgina Astley way. [Jan 2015, p.131]

A deeply involved performance such as this demands an involved listen, but with concentration (and maybe a little bit patience) Moogmemory marks a glorious return. [Apr 2016, p.103]

File under soundtracks to mescaline days and animal sacrifice nights. [Jul 2016, p.104]

Comically, the group never actually met while recording it. Imagine what they could do in the same room. [#361, p.112]

There's an air around The Exodus Suite of something not quite being finished. [#361, p.114]

[Hollow Bones] is Rival Sons' finest work yet. [Aug 2016, p.115]