This is Black's strongest set of songs since 1994's second solo selection, Teenager Of The Year, largely because the trademark wit and weirdness is back.

Although it holds together better than out-takes album might, newcomers should start elsewhere. [July 2008, p.101]

It doesn't always work.... But when they hit their hypnotic stride on the pulsating title track and the languidly poppy Talk, there's loveliness and invention to spare. [Nov 2015, p.104]

Strives a little too hard to display their twitching eclecticism. [Feb 2006, p.101]

Django Django have proved they can blur the boundaries: now they need definition. [Feb 2018, p.114]

There's still vigour in The Orb's ambient house vision. [Jun 2020, p.105]

The rest is a textbook example of a major African artist successfully reaching out toward Western ears without sacrificing integrity. [June 2009]

Marauder is not the sound of a group chasing lost sounds or long ago glories, rather it is a band detaching itself from its past, from a time that has long defined them; it is the sound of growing older, closer and more open. [Sep 2018, p.108]

It's an album which reflects its makers' confidence. [Sep 2014, p.116]

Its breezy mix of acid pop, acoustic whimsy and sunshine funk drifts by with all the staying power of a warm afternoon. [Aug 2018, p.108]

Three Wu-Tang MCs join forces; bring the pain. [July 2010, p. 136]

The songs here are supremely catchy and delivered with the kind of sleek sheen you'd expect from a Katy Perry or Kesha record, but it's the inventive instrumentation and surprising twists they take that give Happy To You its edge. [May 2012, p.104]

Public Service Broadcasting stitched archive audio footage into evocative instrumentals. [Mar 2015, p.114]

Suffice to say, the issues addressed here are as big as the music. [Nov. 2011, p. 142]

Essential listening for mall rats everywhere. [Aug 2006, p.113]

The follow-up To 2008's ProVisions is another fine addition to his cannon. [Dec 2010, p.109]

At its best, it makes for exhilarating listening, as on 'Crimewave' and the bleep-funk soundclash that drives 'Air War' and the unexpectedly tender 'Courtship dating.' [June 2008, p.138]

Confidence seeps through Coldplay's eighth album. It's a thrilling new start, a daring way to kick off their second chapter. [Jan 2020, p.104]

Tortured and in need of an edit, it's not for the casual listener. [Aug 2014, p.111]

24 Karat Gold appeals because it's a new Stevie Nicks album that sounds just like an old Stevie Nicks album. The downside is that the modern-day Stevie faces some stiff competition from her younger self. [Nov 2014 p.110]

The general vibe is of music for well-upholstered hotel suites. [May 2020, p.104]

A variable trip. [Dec 2016, p.105]

It's tempting to say that Groves makes music mature beyond her tender years, but tha's wrong. It would be stunning no matter how old she was. [Jun 2009, p.117]

Death Magic feels like the work of a band who have pulled themselves together, but might be more fun falling apart. [Sep 2015, p.110]

Butler's gang of misfits may fall further below the radar on the back of this, but artistically he's on to something. [Jun 2014, p.112]

The voice and their lyrics sit differently, somehow, against Knopf's arrangements, which can be by turns delicate, mischievous and furious. [Nov 2015, p.105]

Their third album is their most developed yet.... What's missing is that sense of real emotion, the euphoria or misery that makes for great pop. [Feb 2016, p.108]

Glows with retro colour. [Jul 2004, p.110]

Almost defiantly ramshackle the mix of classy songcraft and threadbare instrumentation nonetheless makes for a compelling listen. [Jun 2014, p.118]

Settle Me Down is an elegantly executed ballad and Dark Waltz evokes Creedence Clearwater Revival at their finest, but the unspectacular Another Night gets bogged down in sub-Springsteen-isms. [May 2014, p.115]

McCabe details a stoner's humdrum city life a touch too convincingly at times, but the spirit of musical adventure is nonetheless commendable. [May 2004, p.111]

South Coast Krautrockers' quirky, moody fourth. [Feb. 2011, p. 114]

A perfeclty poised, richly textured set of light-footed psychedelic pop. [Sep 2003, p.101]

Hard, reverb-heavy, yet fluent guitar arabesques topped by husky, yearning, sorely troubled vocals. [Nov 2000, p.110]

An often-inspired collection of eccentric pop songs and unexpected proggy workouts. [July 2002, p.108]

An astonishing reassertion of relevance for Plant. [July 2002, p.118]

A set of songs so cockle-warmingly familiar that you're left scanning the credits to see who did them the first time. [Oct 2002, p.118]

Happiness may remain an elusive quality in AIC's music, but variety is not. Be it the acoustic parts in Fly or elegant a cappella vocals of Maybe, they juggle power and poignancy like masters. [Sep 2018, p.110]

Groundbreaking and mind-boggling. [Mar 2012, p.111]

The meticulous arranged synths, crackling guitars and electronic glitches ensure the attention never wavers. [Feb 2016, p.114]

What it lack in surprises it makes up for in songcraft. [Oct 2017, p.108]

While tracks such as This Day Is A Loaf could be straight out of an album by Stevens himself, it's when the band stretches out, on the gentle but unsettling Hosanna In The Forest, that they really excel. [Apr 2011, p.101]

Everything here sounds like a happy accident and that's part of the appeal. [Nov 2015, p.108]

Mount's intoxicating amalgam of past and present is the real thing. [Apr 2014, p.114]

It perfectly captures the oscillating other-worldliness of their sound. [Oct 2016, p.110]

The Helio Sequence add lucioous electronic icing to their songs but too often this mearly masks predictable indie rock. [Mar 2008, p.104]

There is sparkling pop invention in abundance here, and, homage or not, that surely transcends any decade. [Jun 2011, p.106]

Women & Work strikes a party-hearty country-soul vein. [Feb 2013, p.103]

It might alienate those who prefer him to wallow, but there's magic and bravery here. [Dec 2008, p.130]

At it's best, it's impeccable. [Jan 2013, p.107]

Damogen Furies is one of his more consistent efforts. [May 2015, p.111]

The high proportion of psychedelic plods make this record feel like a missed opportunity--elegantly wasted, but wasted all the same. [May 2016, p.104]

It's as if, in the very best sense, they don't care any more. [June 2008, p.138]

Inspired by New York's Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, The BQE is an ambitious orchestration to accompany the film of the same name. [Dec 2009 p. 127]

At Glastonbury she dazzled; here she plays it safe. [Sept. 2011, p. 105]

They are still capable of arrestingly brilliant pop songs, but, judged against past achievements, Velocifero is a step backwards. [July 2008, p.102]

A roster of guest vocalists elevate his noir-shaded take in Detroit techno and '80s "dark-wave" synth-pop. [Dec 2017, p.102]

A frustratingly dull affair. [May 2012, p.109]

A few pop-soul cliches creep into the album's cluttered middle section. But the rest is 21-st-century electronic pop delivered with style and ambition. [Aug 2013, p.106]

Their songs retain a Scandinavian feel, at once exuberant and enigmatic on the soaring Fountain and cellophane-wrapped Vista, while pulsing, M83-like synth rush of Chasing Kites shows they've set their sights well beyond the Nordic margins. [Jan 2015, p.126]

The laser-guided synth-pop of The Natural World, hip-thrusting disco epic Like An Animal and Erosion's Invocation of early New order all pulsate with the excitement of a band discovering new capabilities, even if Cleverly's somewhat histrionic vocal style can take some getting used to. [Feb 2014, p.115]

A perfect distillation of creatively experimental folk music in the UK today. [May 2008, p.126]

Reggae-rap soundclash fails to catch fire. [July 2010, p. 136]

Love Is Dead's songs, however, don't so much burrow into your brain as thwack you over the head, and the band's tendency to fashion refrains from little more than the song titles means some tracks are memorable simply by dint of merciless repetition. [Jul 2018, p.114]

There's always been a wistful strain to [Cook's music]. Youth's contribution is to amp up the dreaminess in a way that perfectly suits songs such as Lunar Addiction and Ghostly fading. [Apr 2018, p.108]

Everyone will say this sounds like Beck, but at the last count Beck would be lucky to sound like Eels.

While Cuttin' Heads hardly stretches him, Mellencamp dresses up his old tricks beautifully. [Mar 2002, p.125]

Halos & Horns has Dolly reaching fever pitch with Hello God and, with Not For Me, singing as beautifully as she has ever done. [Aug 2002, p.131]

She avoids excessive sugariness via edgy, sensual lyrics and Timbaland's superlative production. [June 2002, p.123]

An adult rock record in which nuance succeeds over bombast. [Dec 2002, p.108]

Looking for fresh inspiration, he relocated to Los Angeles for this third album, embarking on some musical revisions that will surprise even long-time fans.

Trouble is, they're often only half-good songs. [Feb 2003, p.94]

Chill-out with substance. [May 2010, p.117]

The likes of Once and Now That I Found You suit the stripped-back aesthetic perfectly but it's the strings-assisted version of Sad Song that is the real showstopper here. [Jun 2020, p.100]

All too often the joy is forgettable. [Feb 2013, p.106]

James has surprisingly reunited for this equally surprisingly strong comeback album. [May 2008, p.135]

The whole thing might be like travelling back to a nightclub in Leeds in 1983 but it's executed with a gloomy elan that allows you to forgive its occasional silliness. [May 2018, p.112]

Black Bubblegum has a more amiable feel, assembling DIY jams inspired by Afrobeat and reggae, not to mention the fringes of Animal Collective's back Catalogue and Texan outlier Sun Araw. [Aug 2016, p.110]

Mostly Born In the Echoes is a blast. It's just that sometimes it's a blast from the past. [Aug 2015, p.108]

They've decided to jag in a radically different direction, aiming here for a shimmering gloom that's reminiscent of early Cure records. By and large, it works. [Jul 2016, p.106]

A record that perhaps only Dylan fans need apply for. [Aug 2012, p.110]

If none are the kind of songs likely to be remembered with misty-eyed affection in another 40 years, they at least entertainingly tackle matters few others would. [Mar 2006, p.104]

A typically quirky commentary on contemporary culture's transient nature that's also attuned to the shifting moods of modern club sounds. [Feb 2019, p.116]

A charming album. [May 2006, p.128]

There's a human message: No matter where you are, the party's what you make of it. [Jul 2010, p.124]

Yet while these tracks might bring Nelly Furtado's Timbaland-fueled makeover to mind, there is more to She Wolf than glossy dance-pop. [Dec 2009, p. 124]

It's stylistically close to 2012's excellent Interstellar, but on this form, too much of a good thing just isn't possible. [Dec 2013, p.112]

Five years in, they've still to learn that less can sometimes be more. [Jun 2016, p.112]

Their most adventurous and assured album to date?

There's no doubting her sonic ambitions, the glowing multitracked vocals and eclectic instrumentation here resembling a kind of lo-fi, one-woman version of Animal Collective. [Jun 2009, p.117]

Feels so far behind the curve that it's just rolling gently backwards on roller-skates at this point. ... More edge, it seems, would only burst their bubble. [Jun 2020, p.106]

A hip hop album of raw and unusual playfulness. [Jan 2010, p. 118]

Seratones' opening salvo might be impressive but you can't help feeling their timing couldn't be worse. [Aug 2016, p.117]

Nothing quite matches its [Snow's] shock and awe and there's some of the old water-treading in Falling, but there's menace in the repetition of "my tears well up and cry for you" on the spooked Petals and she's never sounded quite so otherworldly as she does on Corduroy Legs. [Jul 2016, p.113]

The spirit of drunk adolescence, cramped kitchens and broken valuable endures on their frightfully fun debut. [Mar 2013, p.101]

Their debut turns out to be a lovely slice of Americana, tastefully underpinned by warm harmonies, acoustic guitars and a melancholy yearning for lost youth. [Oct 2009, p.118]

Weighted by retro production that gets bogged down in neo-soul moves reminiscent of Sade, though, inspiration flickers throughout without ever reaching full illumination. [Jun 2014, p.118]

An 18-song adventure in sparse and particular beauty. [Jun 2020, p.97]