Barely any light gets in during nine tracks that all sprawl over five minutes, titles such as DTM. (Dead To Me), Screamin’ Jesus and the racism-savaging Duke’s God Bar harnessing the rage Vega called an energy into seething walls of multi-tiered electronic cacophony, wailing guitars and jackhammer beats, although the closing Stars carries the underlying optimism that was also a crucial element in his work.

As Light Return pushes The Telescopes’ sound to newer, often much darker places. It’s a bracing and occasionally totally disarming listen, but utterly compelling throughout.

Spirit Reflection entrances with its delicate, gossamer vocals drizzled over dreamy, summery soundscapes.

As befitting a band who met studying music at Toronto’s Humber College, this Late Night Tales is akin to capturing a conversation by friends bursting with excitement, sharing their latest musical finds.

Most of these songs (with the exception of the spooked, slow burner Hawaii--featuring a fantastically creepy snigger on the intro--and the yearning, melodically twisting beauty of Give Me Strength) would find their way onto various Young albums of various vintages over the years, but there’s an accumulative effect in hearing performances of songs as powerful as Pocahontas, Powderfinger and Campaigner unadorned and fresh in their authors mind.

Finally, this disturbing masterwork’s moment in the sun. Phoebus be praised.

There’s an easy charm about the whole project that lends it a robust confidence.

Opener If You’re Here is a perfect encapsulation of his art. Languorous, gentle, slightly off beat, its discordancy is offset by gorgeous harmonies sung with customary fragility by Oyamada. The rest of the album rides his well-established line between indie and electronica, with the quirk-heavy Sometime/Someplace and Helix/Spiral--a neat take on krautrock by way of Stereolab – providing the highlights.

He’s still doing his thing but goes deeper when he digs (It’s A Jungle Out There’s litany of modernity’s failings), he’s more wicked when he picks a target (white privilege on Brothers), and is still pushing the boundaries of his craft (all of it).

Cooper ventures further out, navigating abstract naval routes plotted by lonely hearts and plagued by daydreams, his tides of burbling static and deftly deployed lap-steel influenced by the solitary missions of real-life sea salts such as Vital Alsar and William Willis, their adventures a certain metaphor for Cooper’s own singular musical path.

At 121 tracks, a running time of nearly nine (NINE!) hours and 55 unreleased songs, it’s somewhat redundant to say this seven-disc boxset documenting the first decade of Fairport Convention’s life is strictly for the hardcore. Sadly – and herein lies the lament of the wallet-destroying boxset--in Come All Ye are songs that would convert a non-believer at 10 paces.

Produced by Memphis Boys’ bassist Tommy Cogbill, who had also played on Pickett’s sessions, Arthur Alexander mixes greasy soul with country funk.

At its best, the record touches on a manic, countrified rock that very early Kings Of Leon might’ve deemed too farmyard to get away with. Occasionally it bleeds over into a blander, stadium sound that seems unbefitting of its creator. But it’s never dull, and in fact often white-knuckle. It’s just a shame it took so long.

While the relaxed vibe is continuous, the music isn’t repetitive but there’s nothing really new here: rather it’s an extension of what Sade’s band Sweetback and trumpeter Roy Hargrove’s RH Factor were doing well over a decade ago. Even so, it’s an enthralling fusion of sounds and styles.

Paranormal lacks both the nostalgia factor of its predecessor and a concept such as the one behind 2008’s Along Came A Spider. It also can’t claim to be a return to heaviness such as Dragontown from 2001. So what does it offer? Not much, other than a moderately listenable set of songs.

Hhe serves up striking versions of some of his most famous Riverside-era compositions, including Rhythm-A-Ning, and Well, You Needn’t. Also featured is the only known studio recording of Light Blue. The second disc in this 2CD package includes alternate takes and rehearsal versions and is accompanied by an informative 60-page booklet, including an essay by Monk’s biographer, Robin D G Kelley.

10 tightly produced co-writes with the massively influential polymath suggest they might finally strike lucky.

The Dears handle such disparate moods, genre fluidity and instrumental complexity with an architect’s precision.

The set mops up a satisfying amount of previously unreleased session material from 1967 and adds the first real stereo mix of the whole Wild Honey LP. ... But the real revelations come with the bonus tracks.

It’s a tremendously playful collection that veers from the spectral spaghetti western of Visa To The Stars to Chicken On The Rocks; an screwball jaunt that’s begging to be used as the theme for an absurd Radio 4 panel show.

The most vibrant cuts here, Long Time Coming and Brand New Name On An Old Tattoo, rise above generic nostalgia, but very little else is worth a second listen.

While this release fails to be definitive, at least it’s a start for a discography that had been long neglected by its creator.

The problem isn’t simply that he starts the album fixating on his reflection in Mirror and rarely budges. It’s that without a foil to contribute drama or dynamism to his doldrums, Pierce’s echo chamber of mithering is all-consuming.

Between Stuck’s bright indie-jangle and the layered guitars of the reflective Something Else, the result offers testimony to the robust flexibility of Chastity Belt’s alt. indie foundations; they make the evolution seem natural, not stretched.

Banditos light-heartedly plough a furrow of 60s garage-psych, soul, blues and country with a punkish good-time sense of savvy.

Twenty five years into your career, Dear is proof that heavy not only still rocks, but that under your [Boris'] charge, it is unlikely to get boring.

Despite being a compilation, this collection has an immaculate flow--like all Beach House albums.

Overall, the sound is pristine--it’s been remastered from the original 24-track tapes by esteemed engineer Paul Blakemore--and is accompanied by a thick booklet packed with essays.