Thirty-one minutes in there's almost a tune, but mostly this happily meanders like a horse grazing a path to nowhere in particular. [Oct 2009, p. 115]

Clinic have performed a remarkable metamorphosis for the melodic, dreamlike Bubblegum. [Nov. 2010, p. 106]

The occasional clunker's certainly not enough to take the shine off a solid, consistent album. [Jan 2013, p.110]

They carefully remodel Gentry's Southern storytelling. [Mar 2019, p.116]

The mood change from insurrection to brooding dystopia makes for a less immediate set of songs, but listen long enough and this is another powerful, affecting set. [Mar 2020, p.114]

Get Guilty bursts with dazzling tunes and--for him--relatively simple arrangements. [Apr 2009, p.108]

Despite the title's hint at unruly emotion, the surface of Aalegra's music stays as polished as her voice. [Sep 2019, p.108]

Deliberately sparse and bare. [Mar 2005, p.99]

This fifth album shouldn't disappoint them [their fans]. [Jun 2011, p.114]

The voice may be thinning, but with age comes a quiet still wisdom. [Nov 2009, p.109]

The Futureheads have found their way back by making their most emphatic statement yet. [June 2008, p.144]

His third album keeps the momentum going, even if its utilitarian construction is probably better live. [Oct 2009, p.118]

It's practically impossible not to fall just a little bit in love with both the singer and her beautifully fragile music. [Jul 2012, p.112]

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

Blues of Desperation rarely deviates from the burnished hard-rock-meets-raw-blues template last explored on 2014's Different Shades Of Blue. But everything comes spiced with clever melodic tics. [May 2016, p.106]

This is ambitious, outward-looking pop unafraid to play by its own rules. [Aug 2016, p.102]

In spite of an occasional sense of deja vu, this is a spacious, raw record that sees Tonra trying something new while holding on to the core that's propelled her thus far. [Feb 2019, p.111]

It resonates with the kind of high seriousness that never weighed on his father. Still, the younger Jeffes brings a winning feel for modern, post-ambient arrangements. [Dec 2019, p.113]

The star of the show remains the Brummie Everygeezer and his droll, unceremoniously-delivered bars. [Summer 2020, p.100]

Though more than pastiche, it's not pop genius yet either. [Aug 2006, p.114]

A happy return. [Oct 2014, p.103]

Whatever Port O'Brien went through over the last 12 months was evidently painful, yet it's upped their game considerably. [Nov 2009, p.111]

It's full of high drama, intense melancholy and crepuscular euphoria. [Nov 2013, p.116]

Prairie Wind finds Neil Young on fine creative form and all too aware of the limited time he may have left to enjoy it. [Nov 2005, p.118]

Such a nuanced take on pop's paisley-coloured past won't be to everyone's taste, but devotees will be left dizzy. [Jul 2012, p.95]

Clearly le maestro hasn't lost his touch. [Dec 2015, p.114]

11 strong songs which ache, break and twang as craftily as they do sincerely. [Jun 2017, p.110]

[Has] a sunnier, jangly guitar pop backdrop. [Jul 2003, p.102]

Feels oddly half-baked. [Apr 2003, p.100]

It's a long time since anyone left their club past behind with this much panache. [Jun 2004, p.103]

His rap style isn't as distinctive as Ja Rule or DMX, but as the singalong Many Men (Wish Death) shows, with Eminem on his team, there's no stopping him. [May 2003, p.98]

A return to heavy, complex and vicious riffing, though Sam Carter's sporadically tuneful vocals still offer respite. [Jun 2012, p.100]

It's quite a feat to produce music that works for the mind and the hips, but Ronson has pulled it off magnificently, with virtually every track sounding like a single. [Feb 2015, p.104]

Impeccable taste and genuine love shines through like sunlight on grimy garage windows. [Dec 2012, p.99]

It's that juxtaposition between sunshiny pop and yearning lyrics that defines much of The Now Now. ... This latest chapter in the Gorillaz story sounds like a deeply confessional one. [Summer 2018, p.108]

By turns thrilling and blissful. [Mar 2016, p.115]

Display[s] a broad musical taste that brings elements of Jack Johnson-styled folk and XTC jerk-pop to their unbridled, youthful joie de vivre. [Mar 2006, p.107]

She's good and snarky on Charmer. [Nov 2012, p. 101]

It's undoubtedly her strongest record yet. [Mar 2016, p.111]

Only the occasional squalling, free-jazz meltdown gets in the way of letting the good times roll. [Jun 2016, p.114]

It makes for one of the most delicious albums of the year. [Sep 2016, p.113]

Ultimately, Qualia's propulsive grooves make it the perfect soundtrack to a journey. [Nov 2017, p.115]

He lets the currents take it where they will, from the churning tumult of The Wave to the cresting, Bon Iver-ish Broken. [Dec 2019, p.113]

Marshall sounds at peace here, and back to his best. [Apr 2020, p.110]

It's perhaps not a career peak but it's not too far away. [Oct 2015, p.102]

As ever, she's at her best when her guard is down. [Oct. 2010, p. 113]

[Bryan Ferry] corkscrews the concept in an instrumental tribute nit only to the very first cocktail'n'cocaine era but also to his own serpentine melodic gifts. [Mar 2013, p.101]

Pomposity reigns and the songs are too one-paced to ignore it. [Mar 2013, p.104]

As an album, it's something of a revelation; the stunning sound of an artist being born again. [Oct 2015, p.113]

There's a potent '80s smoke machine-ambiance wafting through the plush, slow-fizz synths and padded percussion that fill their debut full-length. [Oct 2013, p.100]

A real leap forward. [Apr 2005, p.126]

While there is much to admire, some of the wilfully discordant tunes grate on subsequent listens. [Nov 2008, p.107]

Rarely makes for easy listening.... though the album's second half is notably more harmonious. [May 2016, p.104]

Some detached ambient pieces remain, but at its best it makes for luxuriant listening. [Sep 2013, p.106]

A great leap on from an already remarkable debut. [Oct 2012, p.114]

Sigworth is Moyet's musical soulmate and this is her best LP in decades. [Jun 2013, p.103]

Snapshots of old stand-bys come through, but it's in tunes such as the disco tribute Rainbow and the clonky piano of The Drifter that his gift for marrying the modern to history, both recent and ancient, really shines. [Apr 2015, p.108]

It's hard to find anything here that will break them out of the retro-rock ghetto and into the 21st century. [Sep 2016, p.102]

There are times when it can feel a little festival theatre tent. Even so, the musical chemistry is clear, and at best, captivating. [Feb 2017, p.112]

They sound revitalised by the radiance of these songs, liberated from the heavy burden of being the Manic Street Preachers. [May 2018, p.102]

Their debut's wilful eccentricity is mostly unconvincing. [Mar 2020, p.119]

Hey Joy, the second track on The Districts' fourth LP, is a moment of near-perfection. ... It's a bar the rest of You Know I’m Not Going Anywhere never quite reaches, though, it comes close. [May 2020, p.106]

Zebra finds Georgopoulos in purely instrumental mode, boundary-blurring jazz, African, Balearic and kosmische influences with mixed results. [Summer 2018, p.106]

A concise soundtrack of garage racket, gospel-informed blues, glam balladry and piano confessionals. [Jun 205, p.104]

Matt Shultz has never sung more convincingly, but these are big, ideas-drenched songs, packed with beguiling twists and turns. [Jan 2016, p.108]

A wildly inventive yet mainstream sound that suits her lyrics. [Mar 2016, p.106]

An utter gem. [Apr 2017, p.110]

Under all the Iggy Pop mumbling, splintered ballads and warped Western themes, it seems they keep bubbling back up. [Oct 2017, p.105]

Matches Slipknot for manic intensity while employing a freeform approach to songcraft which invites comparison to the lunatic-fringe rock of the late '60s. [Sep 2001, p.122]

Proffers a newfound poignancy. [Nov 2003, p.110]

Despite the presence of original Patti Smith Group members Lenny Kaye and Jay Dee Daugherty, this lacks the buzz of her past material.

Five years ago she collaborated with Brian Eno and U2 producer Daniel Lanois on the ambient Wrecking Ball. Now she returns with a less intense but no less powerful new record that continues that album's heavy/ethereal vibe, courtesy of producer (and Wrecking Ball engineer) Malcolm Burn, but with a more melodic touch.

It's ultimately too well-mannered and surprise-free. [Jun 2004, p.97]

Solid rather than spectacular. [June 2002, p.110]

There's no doubt that his fingers still know their way around the fretboard.

Folie A Deux is mostly a barrelling, hugely confident record that should see Fall Out Boy swiftly elevated into mainstream rock's premier league. [Jan 2009, p.112]

Pieced together over a two-year period, the results are often stunning. [Oct 2010, p.104]

It's not an instant listen, but there's wisdom and loveliness to spare. [Jul 2014, p.110]

For all the craft she shows, for all her ability to move and for all the promise of the zinging, Indian-inflected Growing Pains, Birdy is undone by an unwillingness to change her musical pace. [Jun 2016, p.110]

For all the many diverting moments, the lack of judicious editing leaves the album spending too much time going round in circles. [Apr 2020, p.114]

Their 11 post-punk/hip-hop songs are brittle, but catchy and fun. [Sep 2006, p.107]

The least adventurous and most disappointing Coral album to date. [Jun 2005, p.106]

These unforeseen electro-moves should rightly bag fresh converts. [Mar 2016, p.113]

Cults' combination of mid-'60s girl-group and cusp-of-the-'90s shoegazing is still bewitching but takes a more stripped-down form here, and packs more of a thwack. [Jan 2014, p.120]

Citay's fourth album hasn't moved far from the excessive Black Sabbath/led Zeppelin grind of their self-titled 2006 debut. Dream Get Together does, however, show more finesse. [Mar 2010, p.98]

The Information... is hamstrung by the sensation that, though Beck likes rapping, he has little to say beyond smart-alec one-liners. [Nov 2006, p.138]

With no track under six minutes in length, some editing wouldn't have gone amiss. [Jan 2013, p.107]

They need to do this again. [Mar 2017, p.112]

Guitar pop at its most ecstatic. [Apr 2006, p.113]

The overall impression is one of a garbled sonic soup. [Oct 2013, p.110]

There's breezy charm to much of the music here. [Feb 2015, p.117]

It's aged remarkably well and All My Love is breathtakingly beautiful. [Sep 2015, p.121]

A listening experience that's frequently compelling, but rarely comforting. [May 2017, p.103]

Beneath the distractingly high-pitched, multi-tracked vocals and tastefully tribal drama, there's nothing more threatening than a synthesized Florence + The Machine. [Jul 2012, p.107]

There are one too many nondescript instrumentals. [Aug 2008, p.139]

The way they shift from the blues-y swagger of Let The Record Play to the percussive march of Pendulum and the R.E.M.-evoking country twang of Yellow Moon is a sure sign that they belong in the lineage of great American rock bands. [Nov 2013, p.108]

Much here amounts to solid AOR, by turns over-polished and underwhelming. [Oct 2017, p.103]

Brand New Eyes sounds like an energised romp through the diary of a small-town American gal--albeit one struggling to reconcile Christian views with the celebrity afforded by more than two million album sales. [Nov 2009, p.111]