At times brilliant, as on the 10CC-gone-disco title track or Belgian pop cover Without Lies, which features California wild-child Sky Ferreia, there are also one too many homages to '80s Italian disco and Euro-trash soundtracks. [Oct 2010, p.103]

There is a whiff of leftovers to You Don't know Anything's six songs. [Feb 2014, p.120]

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]

There's a wobbly quality to La Havas's toplines that means they can get lost in the more densely instrumented tracks, yet the sparser finger-picked guitar numbers give her songwriting space to shine. [Aug 2020, p.108]

Despite its spacious and minimal approach, the album is -- in typical Anderson style -- a demanding piece of work. [Sep 2001, p.106]

With measured assistance from pianist Huw Warren and melodeon Maestro Andy Cutting, it seems almost rude to suggest it's probably too one-paced and cheerless to really warm to. [Mar 2011, p.115]

Hanson's second studio album is better than the first.

Hopefully they'll focus on [their country roots] next time. [Nov 2015, p.104]

Precisely assembled, melodic songs that shiver with emotion. [Sep 2006, p.107]

While the country-slanted Keeper doesn't stray far musically from what's gone before, the mood is more upbeat. [Nov. 2011, p. 128]

In a sign that they've struggled to progress since [their debut], almost every song on this fifth alum similarly ends with Willett combusting into a figure of angst. [Dec 2014, p.108]

There's nothing so prosaic as choruses, but there's warmth to spare. [Nov 2007, p.137]

While the track titles may be minimal, his music teems with beguiling sonic quirks. [Jan 2014, p.125]

It's bigger and brighter. [Mar 2015, p.119]

Danger Days doesn't sound like the future, but it does sound like the sate of My Chemical Romance's art. [Dec 2010, p.102]

The Brighton duo's fourth LP, recorded in Berlin, throws that baggage away in favour of a cavalier hedonism. [Apr 2014, p.105]

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]

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

He gets his message across smoothly without ever needing to resort to heavy-handedness. [Jun 2013, p.107]

An intriguing listen...

Live On Ten Legs is career-spanning, expertly played, surprisingly spirited resume, with the curveballs of Joe Strummer And The Mescaleros' Arms Aloft and a slightly tweaked version of Public Image Limited's Public Image that misses the point by such a distance it borders on skewed genius. [Mar 2011, p.115]

Their heritage might be clear, but over 10 songs and 22 minutes, their grip on the present never lets up. [Aug 2014, p.115]

Alkaline Trio subvert their perky, zinging three chord mall-punk with misanthropy, melancholy and alcohol-sodden, world-weary wisdom. [Jun 2003, p.92]

Mockingbird Time, the band's first album in eight years, places them right back in the hazy glow of Laurel Canyon sunset. [Oct 2011, p.123]

Traces of other bands can be heard everywhere, from the scuzzy math-rock of Doom (Battles) to the hard-riffing Exit-Only (Jon Spencer) but with vocalist Satomi Matsuzaki ensuring that they never sound quite like anyone else. [Dec 2014, p.108]

It doesn't quite touch the invention of the people who inspired it. [Dec 2012, p.100]

As impressively deep as the music's pile may be, however, it's Marshall's towering voice that most recalls Elbow. [Dec 2012, p.109]

It's a vibrant affair. [Nov 2007, p.138]

This debut has enough catchy cheap thrils. [Dec 2007, p.124]

Only some odd choices of collaborators--like actor Joe Pesci on The Nearness Of You--mars what could have been a beautiful swansong. [May 2017, p.111]

This superior debut from Alberta rapper Roland Pemberton cuts adroitly from Oliver Square's booty shaking electro to the spare funk of Black Hand. [Oct 2007, p.101]

It's a curious detour rather than a sturdy follow-up to 2012's Animal Joy, but as a distillation of all those scattered flyers and setlists, it's a quietly touching piece of memorabilia. [Jan 2014, p.125]

Corey Taylor's side project finds him ditching both the mask and the won't-tidy-my-bedroom ire in favour of more eardrum-friendly grunge redux. [Oct 2010, p.103]

An artist on the verge of a spectacular breakthrough. [Oct 2013, p.107]

Recorded as a tribute to former singer Beau Velasco, who died of a drugs overdose in September 2009, it's clearly a form of catharsis. Mercifully their sense of humour remains intact. [Apr 2011, p.101]

Withering, in all the right ways. [Aug 2020, p.105]

Wolfmother 2.0 are as retro as before, at least there's a refreshing variety to the bludgeoning. [Nov 2009, p.115]

There's a cheesy feel to many tracks but it's good fun, delivered with Chilli's soaring harmonies tempering T-Boz's throaty growl. [Aug 2017, p.112]

Jollett's weighty musing are all but neutered by his determination to cover all musical bases but, as an alt-rock starter-kit, it's just about perfect. [May 2011, p.109]

Newcomers might well benefit from starting nearer the beginning, but this is one space saga that's worth persevering with. [Jun 2010, p.120]

Despite its grandiose title [the album] is actually more concerned with sound than ideas, an experiment which proves more intriguing as a concept than it does as a complete listening experience. [Jun 2012, p.100]

It's heavy-hitting, but the price paid is the loss of the subtle details that made them unique. [Jul 2011, p.111]

Worth spending time with. [Jul 2014, p.110]

For all the tastefully understated harmonies and lush orchestration there are times his beats could use a shot of caffeine. [Jan 2017, p.104]

The fun doesn't always translate to the listener. [Jul 2012, p.113]

At times the meandering is frustrating, while at others the release when a song finally locks into its groove, as on the twisting Lipstick Song, makes the experimentation all worthwhile. [May 2020, p.110]

It's a record that renders previous comparisons obsolete. [Feb 2015, p.105]

Simultaneously melancholy and charming.[March 2012, p.112]

Roadsinger is an improvement on his patchy 2006 comeback "An Other Cup." [Jun 2009, p.135]

Giddy with excitement at times, his enthusiasm for life at 58 comes as a relief after 2001's Sex Age & Death. [Apr 2011, p.102]

All in all, it makes for a promising re-start. [May 2015, p.106]

Sonic Bloom is about inch-perfect accuracy. In other words, re-enactment. Period. [Apr 2014, p.115]

Potent, and strangely noble. [Nov 2009, p.112]

A reflection on a childhood spent between Glasgow and Newcastle, Get Lucky is all muted colours, bluesy licks and hard-won wsdom, delivered with a subtlety benefitting the presence of Scottish multi-instrumentalist John McCusker. [Oct 2009, p.113]

It doesn't all work, but there are euphoric peaks... that rival the far-out grooves of David Axelrod and The Flaming Lips. [Aug 2004, p.106]

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.

The maestro's arpeggiators show no signs of seizing up, even if there's a touch of melancholia about Tangerine Dream-like opener First Movement and Clean Air. [Aug 2018, p.116]

The melancholic croon of frontman Will Daunt, a man who sounds as if he's caressing a broken heart rather than nursing it, give these ever-so-now songs an old-world charisma. [Jun 2012, p.115]

Mulberry Violence is uniquely unhinged. [Sep 2018, p.117]

Fink runs the folk gamut from A and B quite beautifully. [Aug 2014, p.106]

Revisitations of several Fall tunes, such as Hotel Bloedel from Perverted By Language, allow her glam spirit to shine, minus MES's obfuscation. New compositions are hot too. [Nov 2017, p.104]

For all the wit, layered invention and easy-on-the-ear harmonies Deakin and Franglen bring to '64-'95, there's a corresponding lack of intrigue. [Feb 2005, p.94]

It's hard to see it as anything more than another mildly diverting whim. [Apr 2006, p.116]

Many of the collaborations are jarring. [Jul 2006, p.115]

What really matters here is texture, delivered in abundance as she plucks and picks her way around harps, guitars and all manner of acoustic backing, her celestial freak-folk voice bewitching the listener. [Oct 2010, p.103]

There's an element of "always the same but always... the same" here--but when Pollard hits his cryptically emotive cruising altitude on Carapace or The Rally Boys the guitars accelerate around their pilot, his chose songwriting vehicle always flies. [Apr 2019, p.113]

As an attempt to connect while keeping aloof, it succeeds. [Feb 2015, p.108]

[The songs are] played with enough ear-catching acuity to satiate your inner psych-pop gourmand. [Jan 2014, p.126]

Margo Timmins gives haunting, basilisk voice to the songs ... even familiar listeners will be intrigued. [Dec 2011, p. 125]

Squally closer 'The Dome' aside, he has a surprisingly light voice and--especially on the straight country of 'Doreen' and poppy 'The Banquet Styx'--a deft musical touch. [Oct 2008, p.152]

As the exclaimation mark in their name suggests, their every sentiment is exaggerated, but they do do careening anxiety rather well. [Nov 2008, p.110]

There are unnerving, alone-in-the-forest atmospheres aplenty here. [Apr 2014, p.108]

In comparison, the second solo album from Broken Social Scene/Stars vocalist Amy Millan can't help but seem just a little routine. [Jan 2010, p. 126]

The album plays its best cards early. [Aug 2017, p.112]

Distinct high and lows are lacking, the songs blurring like a long night, but Green remains a mistress of her mood. [May 2014, p.110]

It offers some crunchy, very manly rocking, with riffs, choruses, everything. [May 2010, p.126]

Enjoyable, but a gold star or two short of his 1997 masterpiece, Other Songs.

At times rapturous, it's the title track's mix of dub effects and PiL-inspired vocals that grabs the ears most effectively. [Jun 2011, p.107]

Compared to the angular new wave of yore, the Elastica sound has matured into something far more interesting.

Fixers keep their cosmic meanderings well anchored with strong pop hooks throughout. [Jun 2012, p.101]

Offsetting these slightly creepy lyrics, however, are seductive sonics. [Mar 2020, p.122]

It's an album that suggests You Me At Six are trapped between three, possibly four, different idea of who they want to be. [Mar 2017, p.115]

While taken individually each song has its merits, as a whole, Spook The Herd is disappointing musically, with nothing rising out of the politely artful haze to truly engage. [Apr 2020, p.111]

The weightless combination of flambe-d guitars, glacial vocals and mid-tempo time signatures feels a bit like being trapped in a well-constructed airlock, easier to admire than enjoy. [Jan 2014, p.126]

Though a certain battle weariness has set in, many songs lacking The Wedding Present's trademark guitar bluster of old, Gedge remains wry, dry and wholeheartedly likeable. [July 2008, p.111]

Their first full album polishes some rough edges down to a soft-focus burr as synths eddy away in a fog of sound that is often only given direct form by the haphazard beats beneath. [Dec 2010, p.113]

While she could let her hair down a little more, this record finds plenty of sweet spots between melancholy and euphoria. [Summer 2020, p.107]

But for all their obvious influences, they're as youthfully exuberant as MGMT and surely no band has used echo quite so deftly since interesting-period Jesus ANd Mary Chain. [Apr 2011, p.104]

Get Lost is a deliberate break with the woozy synths of his earlier work. The rest of the LP doesn't quite follow through n that adventurousness. [Aug 2017, p.112]

Essentially, Fatboy Slim is doing little more than repeating his past, but the quality here doesn't suffer for that. [Nov 2004, p.120]

Album 13 of experimental Californian acoustic folk. [March 2011, p. 115]

The good news is that Grotesque rocks like a bastard.... Not so good news is that Manson's shock shtick still lacks real substance. [Jun 2003, p.103]

There are moments of genuine heartbreak amid the musty gloom. [Oct 2005, p.115]

Maynard is clearly being primed to take on Bieber. Hence the ultra-pop, super-slick confections he layers his not altogether unpleasant (but not utterly spellbinding voice all over. [Sep 2012, p.105]

Another French fancy, then, though one likely to appeal only to those with more rarefied tastes. [Jan 2014, p.127]

This third album is more in the same gold-standard, singer-songwriterly vien. [Dec 2008, p.130]

No Way Down mischievously demands to be consumed whole at hazy after-hours sojourns. [May 2009, p.107]

Those seeking the key to The Script's success will remain puzzled. [October 2010, p. 113]