His straitjacket is an entrenched reliance on "lighters aloft" ballads, or, ironically, Oasis-derived anthems. [Dec 2002, p.113]

Not everything succeeds but on Imagination's fusion of ambient synths and stadium-rock guitars or the electro-pop of Collide-A-Scope, Rundgren fashions a sound that offers nods to his '70s prog past but still sounds utterly of the moment. [May 2013, p.109]

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

Continues in the same vein as its predecessor, matching Lynne's soulful vocals with an array of catchy tunes. [#184, p.140]

They veer with a refreshing lack of caution from toytown techno and smart-alec wordplay t the squeaky space-hopper electro of 'Discover Your Colors.' [Aug 2009, p.104]

It takes alt-rock drama and boy-band syrup and bolts on some fun.-size arena-singalong choruses. [May 2013, p.103]

What works onstage doesn't necessarily translate to disc, and that'sthe case here. [Oct 2007, p.108]

After all these years, is that it? [Sep 2004, p.110]

Craig David seems to have accepted he's destined to occupy the middle of the road. Trouble is, it's still not clear which road he's on. [Dec 2007, p.115]

The resulting combination, of despondency and dull melodies, makes for an uninspiring take on dance music past. [Nov 2018, p.111]

It almost inevitably fails to live up to those lofty aspirations. [Nov 2009, p.114]

Boomslang labours under the delusion that The Stone Roses' Second Coming was a good idea worth pursuing in greater detail. [Feb 2003, p.100]

There's nothing as wonderfully warm as My Love Is Your Love, as grandstanding as Exhale (Shoop Shoop), or as innovative as Its Not Right But Its OK. [Feb 2003, p.104]

Pop Etc manage a couple of well-aimed arrows towards the heart. [Aug 2012, p.108]

Chained as they are to the demands of the dancefloor, there's a little room for subtlety in these frantic mash-ups of Coldplay and Empire Of The Sun, but then whoever did their thinking under strobe lights? [Dec 2010, p.115]

Glynne's voice is a powerful weapon to secure audience submission, yet it quickly becomes a weak link, making Florence Welch sound like Vashti Bunyan. [Sep 2015, p.112]

Where once he dreamed of Fireflies, now Young just sounds burned out. [Oct 2012, p.108]

If the original Bat Out Of Hell was Bruce Springsteen's Born To Run as scored by Richard Wagner, this is even more theatrical. [Nov 2006, p.140]

The third album from James Morrison isn't the musical enlightenment that its title suggests, but rather another sturdy, if predictable, collection of soul-tinged, Radio-2 friendly pop tunes. [Nov. 2011, p. 139]

The Balcony is a debut as polite as potpourri. [Oct 2014, p.106]

Hints that Cuomo may be approaching some sort of personal epiphany about his place in the world. [Jun 2005, p.116]

More than a quarter century down the line, Bon Jovi are still living and selling the rock 'n' roll fantasy on The Circle. Why Not? They've done very nicely out of it. [Jan 2010, p. 126]

Rarely has he sung this well. [Feb 2006, p.99]

It's the continual indulgence of Lopez's Gloria Estefan ambitions with various generic Latin tracks, completely at odds with everything else, that really grates.

Slipway Fires requires more of your time and duly rewards it. [Dec 2008, p.120]

When he desists from inserting solos in the middle of otherwise palatable songs, his work can be engaging, even moving. [Oct 2005, p.115]

Like over-keen Masterchef contestants, they chuck everything onto the plate to show off their skills, resulting in a charmless mess of congealed ideas. [April 2012, p.105]

There's little sign of obvious hits. [Feb 2003, p.104]

An album that could finally establish Feeder as major league players. [Feb 2005, p.92]

Few would guess it was about environmental apocalypse; indeed, you can listen to the whole album with out noticing very much at all. [Aug 2010, p.123]

It delivers considerable entertainment value. [Apr 2005, p.122]

They wouldn't be totally awful if Client A could actually sing. [Oct 2003, p.103]

Pop Trash proves to be far from embarrassing...

A disappointing barrage of lethargic metal. [Dec 2004, p.137]

When they strain for sexy modernity... it's as appealing as Mr. Burns writhing round in satin sheets. [Nov 2004, p.119]

The voice that set such a spark to West's Gold Digger should be capable of more than this exaggerated comedy sex routine. [May 2006, p.126]

A collection of irresistible pop-rock anthems. [Nov 2005, p.125]

The bulk of the R&B tracks are gloopy. [Mar 2006, p.106]

It's disappointing to find a glut of songs seemingly calibrated to appease the demographics. [Jan 2005, p.126]

She's got some distance to travel before she's a truly mind-blowing, norm-shattering pop star. She's not the new Madonna, just a very naughty girl. [Oct 2010, p.117]

Tough to endure even once. [Aug 2003, p.110]

Alas, they're not very good. [Feb 2005, p.102]

Chalk this one down purely to an arrangement of Tinseltown convenience. [Oct 2009, p.115]

There are no real songs here, only weak gags and unfunny skits. [Jan 2007, p.152]

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

There are so many idiotically composed adverts between tracks, you wonder if you haven't tuned into a local radio station by accident. [Sep 2003, p.99]

Though fatally flawed, Invincible does boast its fair share of sonic exhilaration. [#184, p.132]

It's raised a notch by the seductive combination of just-grimy-enough production and smooth vocals. [Jun 2003, p.96]

If that hardly sounds like the greatest thing to happen to hip hop in recent times, it's nothing compared to his fourth LP, which is a litany of lazy beats and even lazier rhymes; "Your mama she gets crazy," he instructs on Krazy. [Dec 2009, p. 120]

Simple Plan continue to plough forwards wuth a punk template of such box-ticking efficiency that they at times resemble automatons. [Mar 2008, p.111]

The Fifth sounds like half a dozen different [albums] squashed onto one record. Not good. [Nov 2013, p.115]

This is hollow, pretentious and deeply dull music. [Apr 2007, p.116]

The California band's doomy gothic arias sound unsettling and bold once more. [Sep 2007, p.91]

Each song still has the inevitable moment of electronic ascent but, as with Coldplay's Recent break-up record, you can';t help but wonder how these songs might've sounded left raw and unslickened. [Jan 2015, p.133]

Shaka Rock avoids critical flak, however, by harnessing their Stones-age rock with a groovy undercarriage. [Oct 2009, p.114]

The general rule with Offspring albums is that their buoyant Californian punk will always be pockmarked by two wildly irritating songs. So it is with Days Go By.

Davies' voice, weathered but still fine as a Waterloo sunset, is complemented by few here. [Dec 2010, p.113]

Low on booty-shaking but high on atmosphere. [June 2002, p.119]

Hardly exciting, but it is terrifyingly professional. [Dec 2002, p.110]

His band's 13th album won't bring him the stardom he craves, consisting of amorphous drones in which the creative energy has been reserved for the titles. [May 2008, p.126]

His picture would be that much more moving if he spliced his peaks with the occasional trough. [Mar 2013, p.98]

It won't change the world, but These People will give those other troubadours something to think about. [Jun 2016, p.106]

Most disappointing of all... is the drab nature of Ryder's contribution: slurred, incoherent, and largely based around drug stories and lots of swearing. [Aug 2003, p.103]

Kanye West's debut aside, it's the essential hip hop album of the year so far. [Jun 2004, p.102]

Turn It Up is a wasted opportunity, weighed down by beige soul ballads and cheap-sounding R&B that could have been cranked out for any talent show contestant. [Oct 2009, p.113]

What sets her apart is a nasal, high-pitched quality to her voice, which puts a fresh spin on what is otherwise a familiar format by now. [Nov 2009, p.104]

They've taken their time, but this fine record suggests it may not be too late. [May 2011, p.124]

Attention Deficit Domination goes straight for the doom-rock jugular. [Jan 2012, p.120]

The ideas are all there, they just don't fit together properly yet. [Sep 2012, p.110]

Not enough bold venture, too much going round in circles. [Jan 2013, p.110]

If you can get over the voice--and it is not a lovely thing--Time Changes Everything at least has curiosity value. [Oct 2002, p.104]

When the Crowes stumble into the right place, they soar. Indeed, at its best, their sixth album delivers the same streamlined pleasures that the group rediscovered on 1999's By Your Side.

About as personality-free as rock music gets. [Apr 2004, p.115]

They run a schizophrenic gamut of cinematic moods that bleed into one another jammed together into one disorienting hour that reaches its end without any discernible narrative reward. [Dec 2012, p.104]

The Magic Numbers' central problem remains: too few hooks back up the pretty tunes, and The Runaway becomes an album you want to love, but struggle to recall even as it glides on by. [Jul 2010, p.135]

Eminem has never sounded more like a man out of time. [Mar 2018, p.107]

Mostly it's too laboured to uplift. [Apr 2003, p.109]

the expectancy of being universally tipped for greatness may yet sink her, but she's delivered here. [Mar 2011, p.109]

There's commendable variety among these 17 tracks, but little that rises above the mediocre. [Oct 2007, p.98]

The result glitters like diamond.

Wonky vocals and a lack of guile strangle the project, not least on Efflictim, where a terminal aimlessness befits the melodramatic-teen lyric[s]. [Jun 2012, p.115]

This Machine sounds more like an off-cuts collection than a comeback. [Jul 2012, p.98]

Joel and Benji Madden's fifth album of anthemic dumbness. [Dec. 2010, p. 110]

Brassbound is more convincing than their debut.... But it's hardly adventurous. [Jul 2005, p.113]

At least Nickelback know how to write a tune. [Jul 2003, p.104]

Musically, it sucks. [Feb 2005, p.98]

This fourth album finds them repeating the nifty trick of simplifying Tool's complex musical equations. Math metal for dummies, anyone? [Jan 2009, p.113]

Jovi's delivery of the usual cliches has a curious, sickly sheen. [May 2013, p.96]

Has only occasional flashes of inspiration. [Jan 2002, p.107]

A treat. [Jul 2003, p.108]

MOR for the Ibiza generation.

Only the stripped-down electro of 'Here Comes My DJ' shows anything like his old form. [Apr 2009, p.105]

You'd expect better from a band so on top of their game.

No band can survive on novelty alone, and Electric Six still thrive on parody rather than invention. [Dec 2006, p.134]

Despite it's title and Young's Ben Folds-esque vocals, All Things Bright and Beautiful keeps its beliefs at a distance for the most part. [July 2011, p. 117]

As worthless as it's possible for music to be. [Feb 2005, p.100]

It might propel them deeper into the mainstream, but the artistic price doesn't seem worth paying. [Jun 2017, p.105]

He's beginning to develop his own sound as well as his own voice. [Mar 2004, p.111]