Frustratingly, the tricksy production and Auto-Tuned vocals of the fragmented second-half tend to overwhelm the songs rather than enhance them. [Mar 2016, p.109]

Sounds more fun on paper than it is in reality. [Aug 2006, p.111]

At their best, as on Number 6 single 'Facination,' they are an invigoratingly upbeat experience. But too often they crash through the boundaries of good taste into out-and-out cheese. [July 2008, p.98]

It's a flabbergasting, intense album that demands intense listening. [May 2010, p.123]

Produced again by former Arcade Fire man Howard Bilerman, here spare, lovelorn songs such as zithery vigil The Shore evoke an elegant melancholy, while the more rugged likes of Gold Rush dart forth on galloping drums, fiddles and banjos. [Feb 2010, p. 104]

Reaffirms her gift for big hooks and wry lyrics. [May 2003, p.100]

Slick samples and buoyant melodies are in, dissonant atmospherics pretty much out. [Feb 2002, p.111]

A seedily romantic, kitchen-sink paean to London, We Love The City finds Hefner's previously wan guitar stylings given a coat of production lustre.

While good, clean, hedonistic fun, it feels over-familiar, like somewhere you've visited once too often. [Jan 2002, p.97]

It's a hit-and-miss affair. [Oct 2013, p.105]

It doesn't always work. But overall, The Evens is an engaging debut. [May 2005, p.121]

More depth, and a few metaphorical tidal waves, wouldn't go amiss. [Jan 2013, p.109]

The 15th album of punk-tinged metal has enough spark to show that they can still dance with the Devil. [Apr 2013, p.100]

It works best when these elements are brought to the fore--the shadowy-voyage-into-the-unknown atmosphere of opener Rising or Rain's floating, dream-like synths--creating an eerie, retro-futurist soundworld to get lost in. [Feb 2019, p.112]

An album overflowing with ambition and ideas. [Summer 2019, p.109]

Seventeen years on,... Cake have lost none of their bite. [Feb. 2012 p. 101]

Everything here feels like a Xerox of something that's been done before.[Oct 2014, p.102]

She excels when she stacks up layers of her ghostly choirgirl voice within a more lush framework. [Nov 2010, p.114]

It's a beautiful set of sweeping prairie ballads. [Jan 2014, p.122]

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]

When he dials down the combative cliches, he remains a powerful, compelling lyricist. [Jan 2013, p.110]

A real jewel from an underestimated band. [Sep 2014, p.111]

It's exhilarating in both its fury and its craft. [Jul 2017, p.114]

It still nods to The Velvet Underground and strung-out '80s pioneers Spacemen 3 and Loop, but chord changes are no longer as rare as Shane MacGowan's teeth, and there's more of a pop sensibility. [Dec 2013, p.117]

Moments of spine-tingling transcendence outweigh those of aimless noodling. [Aug 2017, p.110]

Terse songwriting and Hutch Harris's emotionally strained vocals create a liberating sense of urgency--and there's something both modest and succinct about a 32-minute album in the age of infinite MP3s. [Dec 2010, p.115]

A quietly beautiful record. [Dec 2012, p.105]

While My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was anchored by Kanye's galactic ego, Big Boi often gets lost in the crowd. [Feb 2013, p.102]