Understated is a great album, but that's what we've come to expect from Edwyn Collins. [Apr 2013, p.97]

A sombre listen, but a rewarding one. [Apr 2013, p.103]

Although this is a little more concise than their usual output, everything else about their blues-rock bruisers is business as usual. [Apr 2013, p.100]

A constant sense of discovery makes Colored Emotions an easy record to keep returning to. [Apr 2013, p.107]

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

Comedown Machine is their best album since they hit perfection with their debut. [Apr 2013, p.102]

There are flashes of greatness here. [Apr 2013, p.110]

The results are mixed. [Apr 2013, p.94]

Their sixth album uses the same unbending template as ever, but does so with the best songwriting since 2005's Howl. [Apr 2013, p.95]

The result is like a more chaotic Nirvana or Dinosaur Jr, with gentle diversions into geeky indie, drone-rock and fuzz-pop that only enhance the racket-making around it. [Apr 2013, p.109]

Carefully constructed with plenty of inventive, multi-layered vocals, it works best on the livelier songs. [Apr 2013, p.93]

Ring makes it work by resisting the urge to do anything that resembles grandiose. [Apr 2013, p.94]

It's a transformation that makes the delicate beauty of what comes before even more startling. [Mar 2013, p.102]

The 15th album of punk-tinged metal has enough spark to show that they can still dance with the Devil. [Apr 2013, p.100]

It's the music's fiendish complexity and flashes of sublime harmony that captivate. [Apr 2013, p.96]

She plainly knows the meaning and benefit of brevity. [Apr 2013, p.110]

There's stark simplicity to Tonra's lyrics that's evocative enough to consistently land emotional haymakers. `[Apr 2013, p.99]

Life after Defo occasionally feels like flicking through someone's heartbreak diaries. [Apr 2013, p.99]

Keeping hold of their past while seizing the present, Suede are still capable of taking you over. [Apr 2013, p.98]

Fortunately, the game of spot-the-influences swiftly gives way to more complex pleasures. [Apr 2013, p.113]

It's the orchestral pop of Red Rover, Red Rover and the others that sweep the album along. [Apr 2013, p.113]

As a 36-song sequel, the album drags at times. But there's buried treasure here too. [Apr 2013, p.112]

As piano and strings crescendo, concluding Pale Green Ghosts' uncommon vistas of seriousness, levity and disco dancing, you can imagine the singer departing in triumph, and anything but an underdog. [Apr 2013, p.112]

Their gentle, dreamy glide sounds like Foals without the hubbud. [Apr 2013, p.111]

Meditative yet pulsing, awkward yet affecting Suuns' contrasting waves deliver an eerie, engaging adrenalin rush. [Apr 2013, p.111]

There are eager minds at work here. [Apr 2013, p.110]

Graffiti On The Train is a powerful attempt to drop their meat-and-potatoes image. It doesn't always work, but it's to be applauded. [Apr 2013, p.110]

The Stand-In succeeds in sounding expansive without losing any of its intimacy. [Apr 2013, p.109]

It's all as plush and spotless as hotel bedding--lovely, but it may leave you craving a bit a mess. [Apr 2013, p.109]

Beta Love ultimately feels unfinished. [Apr 2013, p.109]

Fans of early Beck, Spacemen 3 and Galaxie 50 will love it. [Apr 2013, p.109]

While the more traditional sounding songs that remain are unquestionably excellent, it does seem odd to leave such a good idea only half explored. [Apr 2013, p.108]

MBV isn't perfect; sometimes the songs do drag, but the brilliant moments are so brilliant, and the exciting moments so exciting that you'll forgive them. [Apr 2013, p.108]

Much of this third album comes on like a bubblegum Breeders, sparsely arranged around Nash's spinal basslines. [Apr 2013, p.107]

The first few tracks feel like a positive transformation into sharper songcraft, but when New Moon latter half descends to the noisemongery of yore, right down to Freaky's flat-out Dinosaur Jr.-ism, one does have to ask: will the real Men please stand up? [Apr 2013, p.107]

Mount Moriah give the Southern tradition an indie-rock twist that's more effective the further they go. [Apr 2013, p.107]

Gloomy and wonderful. [Apr 2013, p.105]

While such single-mindedness doesn't leave much room for light and shade, at its best Pearl Mystic is testament to the power of head-nodding repetition and well-stomped FX pedals. [Apr 2013, p.104]

Very silly, but with enough invention to sustain interest. [Apr 2013, p.104]

They're brilliant as such but, with a couple of exceptions, not quite so fun in the cold light of day. [Apr 2013, p.104]

It might be a record looking to the past, but it has Harris and Crowell doing some of the best work of their careers. [Apr 2013, p.103]

Hitchcock continues on a roll, all 10 songs here hooking you in with the head-nodding grooves and dreamy psych-pop tunes of seasoned pro. [Apr 2013, p.103]

Day Before We Went To War, co-written by Brian Eno, inflects mundane details with enigmatic dread in a similar fashion to the frostbitten adult pop if ABBA's final years. If only you could hear this colder, bolder Dido in every song. [Apr 2013, p.101]

It's a minor-chord menace, their darker surf-steeped vibe driven by steady percussion and hypnotic basslines. [Apr 2013, p.101]

The Big Other is a pure and unexpected delight. [Apr 2013, p.101]

Endless Boogie isolate the kind of grinding blues rock riffs you'd hear on AC/DC, Canned Heat or early Beefheart records and cane them relentlessly. [Apr 2013, p.100]

When Allien adds a taste of techno's rhythmic grunt, some focus is briefly achieved, but unfortunately it happens all too briefly. [Apr 2013, p.94]

Ultimately, there's something delicious and monumental about Hurts.[Apr 2013, p.106]

[Natalie Bergman's] undoubtedly gifted, but the end result feels as passionless as a first date at Starbucks. [Apr 2013, p.112]

This is a beautiful album that counterpoints Banhart's boundless and surreal imagination against a newly-discovered depth and sincerity. [Apr 2013, p.105]

The tempo seldom rises beyond a twitch, or Buttery's voice above a murmur, News From Nowhere is warm and confident. [Apr 2013, p.99]

At times, all this loose-limbed craziness can become tiresome but like an excitable friend dragging you onto the dancefloor by the sleeve, they make it very a=hard not to join their party. [Apr 2013, p.97]

They may be too post-modern for some tastes, but Thurston Moore has his sonic menace back. [Apr 2013, p.97]

Temper Temper, their fourth, adds an aggressive edge to their sound. [Apr 2013, p.96]

Like Boys Outside, Monkey Minds casts Steve Mason as a gifted songwriter, a world-worn bringer of anger, melancholy, hope and melody. [Apr 2013, p.96]

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

Bad Blood feels strangely anemic.[Apr 2013, p.95]

It's the sort of manic outsider funk that succeeds or fails on the basis of how charming you find Nguyen's delivery. [Apr 2013, p.95]

His imaginative, smartly delivered lyrics hold the attention during those moments when producer Lewis's beats don't quite match them for sparkle. [Apr 2013, p.94]

Clocking in at a shade over tow hours, there's room for fans of all vintages to find something of value. [Apr 2013, p.94]

The Next Day is a loud, thrilling, steamrollingly confident rock and roll album full of noise, energy, and words that--if as cryptic as ever they were--sound like they desperately need to be sung. [Apr 2013, p.92]

The Deserters produces a gently psychedelic kind of romantic chamber-pop. [Jan 2013, p.113]

Sudden Elevation sacrifices her native tongue and most of her earlier tweeness, while retaining her capacity to move and enchant. [Mar 2013, p.93]

If some of these drifting, piano-rich tunes aren't reworked into dream-state Ibiza sunset bangers by next summer then, frankly, the world is dancing to the wrong beat. [Mar 2013, p.98]

The jarring throb of HIQS aside, it's an album of subtle charm that rewards repeated listening. [Mar 2013, p.95]

It takes truly special songs to lure you in so deeply you forget it's a museum piece. And for the most part these aren't--they're simply good enough. [Mar 2013, p.105]

A sense of dread pervades throughout. [Mar 2013, o.101]

Starting at a bass-heavy point where crunch is more important than structure, guitarist-singer Joel Flyger nevertheless knows how to write a pop hook. [Mar 2013, p.108]

A lovingly crafted, deeply satisfying step forward. [Mar 2013, p.110]

180 captures all the exuberance of the sweatbox gigs they've held in its basement, while showcasing them as a scorching rock'n'roll band. [Mar 2013, p.106]

Intimately compelling, from his first strum to last breath, Regan passes the acid test of songmanship; all 10 are perfect as they are. [Feb 2013, p.109]

[Pure Love] spiritedly serves up a full album's worth of way-above-par songs, which are radio friendly. [Mar 2013, p.109]

The title track of their fourth album actually begins with a similarly buoyant vein. [Feb 2013, p.107]

His gently intense third album is sometimes breathtaking in its melancholy sweep and songwriting skill, and always absorbing. [Mar 2013, p.96]

It's furious stuff. [Mar 2013, p.101]

Guttural, brutal, and very unpleasant. [Mar 2013, p.101]

There's is much self-dramatising talk of "crazy dreamers," but no magical thinking in the music. [Mar 2013, p.102]

Fusing dubstep and rock worked for Pendulum but it's all too easy to get the balance wrong. Josh and Tony Friend's efforts have succeeded in getting their singles onto Radio 1's A-list, but it's an idea that stalls on their debut album. [Mar 2013, p.107]

Everything is dislocated, kinked and inhuman. [Jan 2013, p.105]

It's a revelation from start to finish and up there with Oldham's best work. [Mar 2013, p.107]

It's arty and possibly proggy, but the warmth of Duncan Wallis's voice never lets it get distant. [Feb 2013, p.103]

Some toy-keyboard boogie-woogie and Krautrock expansiveness add to its charm. [Feb 2013, p.105]

His music, colorful and entertaining as it is here, has yet to supply a definitive answer. [Mar 2013, p.98]

Gary Clark, Jr merges smooth vocals with economical guitar wizardry and makes it all sound less wearyingly pub-rock by embracing the 21st century. [Mar 2013, p.95]

In the end, pretty and vacant just about covers it. [Mar 2013, p.94]

A little less austerity, however, might have made it easier to warm to the experience as a whole. [Mar 2013, p.94]

The musical collage approach, is the starting point for a captivating album of pop electronica. [Mar 2013, p.101]

The suspicion is that, in parts at least, No World was more satisfying to make than it is to listen to. [Mar 2013, p.104]

If seeker of the hip-hop's next wave need not apply, those with an appetite for rugged, screwfaced late-90's New York rap should find this keeps them scowling like it's 1999. [Mar 2913, p.111]

On ONIFC he tilts the balance back--slightly. [Mar 2013, p.111]

Hamilton's languid, Hope Sandoval-style cooing occasionally struggles to keep pace.... But when they're aiming true, Widowspeak strike gold. [Mar 2013, p.111]

Words are what sustain Push The Sky Away. [Mar 2013, p.97]

This is music of incredible warmth, where melody and emotion come before science. [Mar 2013, p.107]

A murkily enveloping record, but one that occasionally misses its predecessor's gonzo sense of fun. [Mar 2013, p.110]

Electric is a first-class showcase for Thompson's spine-tingling solos but not the consistent song collection that was 2010's Dream Attic. [Mar 2013, p.110]

The shadow of Mazzy Star's drowsy psychedelia still hangs heavily over everything they do. But they do it so persuasively, so single-mindedly, that it's never an issue putting that to one side. [Mar 2013, p.110]

By the end, it feels as if Tegan And Sara need to sharpen their edge before they lose their point completely. [Mar 2013, p.110]

Contentment makes Everett a less compelling narrator than devastation, but Eels still tailor songs rich in ideas yet stripped of unnecessary fat. [Mar 2013, p.109]