There's an intriguing musical intelligence operating underneath. [Oct 2015, p.113]

Despite its avowed politics, it lacks firm presence or real weight. [Apr 2017, p.112]

Occasionally... it cloys. [Mar 2007, p.110]

An exhilarating ride from a group who sound completely revitalised. [Jul 2015, p.108]

The joyful whole has a depth and swagger that is as life-enhancing as popular music should be. [Mar 2005, p.100]

Dinosaur Jr producer John Angelo coaxes dreamy harmonies from their skewed sound. [Sep 2011, p.114]

At times, it teeters between nostalgia and self-parody. .... But you can forgive the odd-slip-up, because the whole thing sounds so joyous. [Mar 2018, p.115]

Art Official Age, regrettably, is something we have heard before: an overlong, pan-generic concept album. [Nov 2014, p.107]

This is as bold, daring and vibrant an album as we'll hear this year. [Oct 2009, p.106]

Woken By Noises [is] reminiscent of the third Velvet Underground record. Elsewhere, however, the songs come across as elegant but a little flat, with a noticeable dip around the middle of the album. [Oct 2015, p.116]

It's warmly unreal how in thrall he remains to The Beatles, from melodic progressions down to the thwack of drums, but these heartache-powered ballads retain a simple elation at the power of rock'n'roll. [Jan 2020, p.110]

The melodies running through City People, City Things and Julie, with their hints of Paul Simon at his most wistful, are the measure of anything from Rouse's 2002 purple patch. The rest is charming if sometimes sugar-sweet and a little too inoffensive. [May 2013, p.109]

Mood music in extremis. [Apr 2003, p.110]

This offering is bedevilled by elaborate, overly fussy instrumentation. [May 2002, p.114]

Peachtree Road is home to three songs that can sit alongside his best work.... [but] there are too many saccharine ballads. [Dec 2004, p.128]

It's almost a carbon copy of their early work. [Sep 2003, p.101]

When it works, it works brilliantly. [Dec 2001, p.120]

Musically it's formulaic, with plodding college rock verses morphing into bellowing, nu-metal choruses. [Dec 2003, p.121]

Not Music presents more of their signature future-retro pop exotica. [Dec. 2010, p. 114]

They should always say yes to excess. [Oct 2012, p.107]

Solid ground is simply beautiful, David Davison's reedy warble offset by a ghostly mellotron, while campfire strum-along Was and power-pop gem Israeli Caves are proof that their melodic detour was well worth the effort. [Nov 2010, p.111]

There's an Everyman appeal to Once Upon A Time... that suggests a band on the verge. [Oct 2007, p.88]

He's less convincing when he rocks, but he understands both depth and beauty. [Mar 2015, p.104]

Hunger's three-minute nuggets blend '80s guitar jangle with doo-wop harmonies, the nostalgic charm offset by the neurotic intensity of both the lyrics and frontman Frankie Francis's desperate vocals. [Mar 2011, p.104]

There may be more instant records, but a little effort reaps its own rich rewards. [Feb 2013, p.109]

Sadly much of this record is stuck in the shallows. [Dec 2019, p.114]

While it lacks the sheer otherworldliness of his heyday, it is still a startling successful marriage of old and new. [Aug 2020, p.102]

It's a uniformly lovely if melodically insubstantial mode. [Summer 2020, p.105]

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

Each songwriter is honored, and often improved by Rumer's thoughtful readings. [Jul 2012, p.109]

Stark, speedy, ferocious---all their established calling card are here. [Oct 2015, p.114]

The genre pinballing can work--Brock pulls out his carney Tom Waits voice for Sugar Boats--but it's also uneven, unsteadying. [Apr 2015, p.94]

The real surprises come when they sound relaxed, even delicate. [Oct 2012, p.92]

It's all slick, sassy and infectious, but she's clearly capable of being much more besides. [Dec 2016, p.109]

Not a lot of thought has gone into changing the formula. [Nov 2010, p.111]

With the exception of 'Hummingbird,' they indulge in far too many sixth-form mioments. [July 2008, p.98]

Heavy, punishing and dense groove metal that never quite manages to be memorable. [Oct 2013, p.102]

It veers back to the more melancholy, washed-out experimentalism of their first records, while occasionally seeking to beak new territory. [Nov 2016, p.111]

Matt Skiba's bitter lyrics still have an impressive sting, and with My Chemical Romance on hiatus, his misanthropy may yet secure a broader audience. [Aug 2008, p.135]

An impressively thoughtful album. [Oct 2003, p.103]

So outstanding is 'Cinderella' that its siblings pale in its shadow. [Sep 2007, p.88]

The quartet's hardcore horror shtick has been homogenised to such an extent that this teen-friendly eigth release could soundtrack the next Twilight movie. [Nov 2009, p.101]

Some judicious pruning would have helped, but this is a promising first step forwards, even if it spends it s entire running time looking backwards. [May 2013, p.96]

Throughout, the sense of a man finding his own path is convincing. [Nov 2014, p.111]

Only the closing tracks, where they grow overwhelmed by their own inertia, stands between this and something essential. [Aug 2016, p.115]

Lovelaws feels like an act of introspection that's gone too far, one that might have benefited from a breath of fresh air, a trip outside its head. [Jul 2018, p.118]

One nostalgia trip worth taking. [Oct 2008, p.147]

The results are serviceable. [Jul 2015, p.111]

Although the band makes a gleeful clatter on tracks such as "Collector," the record really shines when the live instrumentation takes a back seat. [Jul 2010, p.133]

While the grooves here prove to be equally minimal [to Headhunter], his debut LP is driven by a febrile, wildstyle energy at odds with dubstep's cavernous soundscapes. [May 2012, p.90]

It's great, with well-judged strings and horns giving full rein to some marvellously acute lyrics.... A glorious return. [Oct 2002, p.117]

Pippen's lush tones are again a good foil for Defever's haunting music. [Oct 2002, p.109]

The nine songs retain an insular, slept-in charm, with the same Californian Nick Drake brief as Mojave 3.

Together We're Heavy's transcendent qualities grow as it flows onward, and the sheer musical ambition of the Spree's pet sound finally, really defies cynicism. [Aug 2004, p.116]

Like most blockbusters, the script is predictable - topics include no-good men, being hard and how great Eve is - but this is designed for booming out of car stereos rather than close listening.

Fulfill[s] glam's promise of tasty geezers in make-up playing shrill, sleazy punk sounds. [Jul 2004, p.121]

Sadly, there's also a depressing quantity of mush and devotion, totally at odds with his grinding best. [Sep 2001, p.122]

The Five Ghosts deserves to chaperone them to greater things. [Sep 2010, p.121]

OHMME add depth to the harmonies on seven of the 10 songs and the overall sense is of five people as excited by playing together as they were at their first rehearsal nine years ago. [Oct 2019, p.114]

At times it's gently dreamlike and beautiful, but its ethereal ambitions often feel like a lack of focus rather than a statement of intent. [Feb. 2012 p. 111]

Short on visceral thrills, but long on soul and dexterity. [May 2019, p.108]

On a concept album about felleing sad and lonely in clubland, and the instrumental flash is balanced out by forlorn lyrics. [Oct 2008, p.149]

The record's strongest, strangest moments come, however, when he lets himself go. [Aug 2014, p.100]

The trip's less balls-on this time. [Jan 2017, p.112]

As the sound of a band revelling in what they do best, it makes for an album that's up there with their most purely enjoyable. [Aug 2017, p.105]

Rarely has he sounded so consistently vulnerable. It suits him. [Nov 2017, p.107]

Telepathe appear devoted to doing something utterly different, which cannot help but be exciting. [Feb 2009, p.116]

A delightfully different gang of fuzzy funk rapscallions. A solution worth soluting. [Jun 2010, p.118]

The World Is Yours is the usual drill: fast, frenetic and very, very loud, with Lemmy belching his messages of defiance and rock'n'roll redemption like a raging, fire and brimstone preacher. Who would want it any other way? [Feb. 2011, p. 124]

A true one-off, you're either a believer or you're not. [Jun 2014, p.106]

Exists in the blurry middle ground that separates provocative experimental art from utter nonsense. [Nov 2004, p.130]

Previous music shine through while new material inevitable has the scrappiness of work assembled posthumously with Peep's childlike drawl sprawling over markedly lighter beats than the dark pop-punk rap he coined. [Feb 2020, p.112]

The rest of King Animal struggles to match "Been Away Too Long" for musical flair or raw energy. [Dec 2012, p.113]

It's pastiche, certainly, but of a pleasingly arresting kind. [Jul 2009, p.118]

In short, a welcome retelling. [Oct 2018, p.116]

Admittedly, there's a lack of shock here, but plenty of awe. [Mar 2014, p.119]

It's a powerful formula, but one the band perfected with their 2002 album Oceanic. [Dec 2006, p.141]

No great leap forward. [Jul 2006, p.113]

Bold, ambitious and revelling in the chaos of the age, 21st Century Breakdown is another perfect document of our times. [Jun 2009, p.114]

[Falls] between the arch electronic vistas of later Magazine and skewed, Giorgio Moroder-esque avant-pop. [Feb 2002, p.114]

Taken as a whole, it's liable to become soporific, but individual tracks are near perfect essays in understated melancholy. [May 2002, p.117]

Tortoise-pace strumming and a crippling shortage of choruses produce only torpor. [Aug 2002, p.131]

Once upon a time rock'n'roll was all about the sex you really shouldn't have. The Kills haven't forgotten. [Apr 2003, p.108]

Teeters between over-studied perfection and heavenly pop glory. [May 2004, p.101]

A fantastic record, full of wonder. [Aug. 2002, p.118]

His rudimentary songwriting skills and questionable quality control render this an exasperating experience. [Apr 2004, p.110]

A too-well-buried treasure. [Aug 2005, p.129]

Invitation Songs treads a well-worn path through dusty Americana, but with aplomb. [Mar 2008, p.100]

Something... is sumptuously produced art-rock, heavily influenced by Sonic Youth and Dinosaur, Jr., but presented with a fresh-faced optimism. [Sep 2008, p.141

Led by the strident vocals of the younger Klara, it is, however, the strength and surprising maturity of the pair's songwriting that makes The Big Black And The Blue such an impressive first effort, not least on the gorgeous Ghost Town. [Feb 2010, p. 105]

By the time Campbell opens penultimate boozer ballad Every Hour That Passes with "You can be the perfect bitch to my bastardness," you'll find it hard not to succumb. [Apr 2011, p.101]

At the end of Monoform, the first track on Leeds five-piece Vessels' second, album, you can pretty much hear the sound of impending collapse, as if the band has begun to implode in the mix.It's at once terrifying and exhilarating. [May 2011, p.127]

At 14 tracks long, it could have done with some editing: there are too many soggy R&B diversions. [Oct 2011, p.113]

New Blood again finds him working with a full orchestra, this time on selections from his own back catalogue. [Dec. 2011 p. 136]

It's not perfect but there's enough invention here for that not to matter. [Mar 2012, p.106]

Packed with songs of delicious but unsettling despair. [Apr 2012, p.98]

Even when the music flags, Smith sings his way through these hillbilly anthems and barroom laments with eerie, unwavering conviction. [Nov 2012, p.111]

They up the anthem count and resemble a lo-fi Dire Straits. [May 2013, p.112]