There's plenty to like about Strangers to Ourselves; it's just that it genuinely baffles that an LP as sprawling as this can have so many different ideas, and so few new ones.

Listeners will likely feel as though they've heard much of this stuff before and, while not of it is bad, that sensation does not exactly make for a compelling listen.

Powerplant is not the strongest record they'll release, but neither, you'd imagine, will it be their last. There's more than enough here to suggest that we may still be in the earlier days of a long and beautiful friendship.

Overall, Entanglement continues Erased Tapes' music and emotional aesthetic which can lift up the anchor of imagination and let its listeners float in its possibilities.

On a surface level, I Thought The Future Would Be Cooler--the group's first album to be released by Downtown Records--has some exceptionally catchy moments.... Still, I Thought The Future Would Be Cooler leaves the listener wishing for a little less preaching and a little more grooving.

IV is perhaps a little too ambitious for its own good. Grandiose aims are never to be scoffed at, but considering that IV's highs are so remarkably high and its lows are so forgettable, one cannot help but wish that BBNG had smoothed out the product.

So while In Glendale is not groundbreaking, revolutionary or gut busting levels of funny, it still provides a humorous, pleasant and suitably mundane peek into the life of a man who has long established himself as a champion of surreal strangeness.

Pick things apart, and it’s a fine addition to the St. Louis band’s catalogue--there are several songs here that will catalyze their already electric live show.

While there are elements to Days Gone By that still don't sit right, the album is an honest exploration of moods, and Bob Moses' unique combination of dance movement and introspective songcraft engages.

Much of the album treads familiar ground, not only to long-time listeners of Fort Romeau, but for any fan of the more minimalist side of House.

Hiccups aside, Begin is an otherwise highly enjoyable album, one that sees Lion Babe fearless in their willingness to experiment with various styles in order to see what works and what doesn't, and it's through that process of discovery that they will eventually find their groove and hopefully the hit singles they are striving to create.

There aren't too many moments on the band's fourth studio LP that are going to reach out and steal you away.

By removing its circumstantial baggage entirely, The Wild Heart Of Life is satisfying and uplifting, and continuously so. But it feels in every way--sans the band’s personal serenity--a regression after Celebration Rock.

Smote Reverser has a strange sense of uncertainty. While Dwyer hasn’t veered away from his band’s unmistakable proggy garage rock sound, he doesn’t feel as invigorated as usual. The multiple flavors of Oh Sees are swirled together, and it ends up a bit diluted.

More Rain is a graceful, though somewhat unrewarding member of that career.

While the group’s mutual wit and sense of lyrical structure could elevate the flattest of records, the kineticism and gleeful weirdness of their individual work is bafflingly absent. Czarface Meets Metal Face is polished but never makes good on the thrills promised by their teasing enterprise ‘Ka-Bang’ off Czarface’s 2015 record Every Hero Needs A Villain.

Ogilala lives and dies by the strength of its songwriting, and while there’s nothing here that even sniffs at the coattails of Corgan’s best work, it is probably the most consistent and least offensively pretentious album he’s put out in, well, nineteen years.

Thank You For Today is uninspired but competent and honest, a laudable addendum to an unquantifiably meaningful legacy.

Their sound feels a little dated, especially when you consider the amount of bands who just a few years ago were producing very similar material. Yet, they show promise and in their final song 'Call Me' show a more introspective side with Vangelis style synthesisers over reverberated guitars.

Colours is not a bad record, far from it. It does, however, feel like an experiment that has gone slightly out of control; exhilarating and dazzling at times, worrying at others.

These Days... is a messy album: half completely unimpressive and half brilliant; botched skits; combined songs and an occasional identity crisis make judging the album as a cohesive whole very difficult indeed.

This is a really hard album to try and get in to, but when it does all click, it feels good. Sometimes it's just hard to tell whether the effort you're putting in is being rewarded or not.

It's a superficial thrill ride but without those evocative moments, that captivating emotional core, it lacks staying power.

Taken in isolation each track holds up extremely well, but as a complete piece of work it sometimes seems to rely on a few too many repeated motifs.

After a year of baited breathing, we seem to have arrived at an in-between. There's still plenty of fun to be had in the waiting room, but let's hope he has more in store for the next appointment.

There is a little too much grace and not enough diss.

While there are hours of discussions to be had about whether "electronic/classical" hybrids can consistently sound good in a pop context, New Eyes provides ample evidence for erring on the electronic side of that split.

Noveller is nothing if not consistent and A Pink Sunset Over No One is another fine example of such success.

Hot Dreams isn't perfect, then, but it is different--and genuine experimentation always demands attention.

You never feel as if Wooden Aquarium lets up, and whether that's something that the band have picked up from having to cram as many songs as possible into their quick-fire live sets or just a nod to their long-held influences, it works very well indeed.

A solid effort that has pure intentions, but just doesn't quite hold the attention in the way some of Diarrhea Planet's peers do. Turn To Gold will find a solid niche of fans, and likely just get a head nod of meager approval from everyone else.

Cuco might not convert naysayers this year, but he clearly isn't overly concerned. He's delivered an easygoing, often charming set of songs, and that's a mission statement fulfilled.

Nine of the album’s ten tracks work perfectly well on their own (the dreary ‘Golden Remedy’ is instantly forgettable and turgid), yet as a collection there is something missing. Many of the songs are mid-paced, lacking the verve and energy which Swervedriver are more than capable of conjuring up. It’s a tough album to get through in one sitting due to the crushing melancholy, but there is still much here to be applauded.

Production wise, it's got the whole package, but behind all the endearing words pouring out of Milo's mouth, there's a lack of emotional connection.

Mechanics of Dominion is too heady for its own good, but still holds ground as a wonderful combination of influences and post-genre style. It takes time for it to reveal itself, and it’s usually worth the investment.

The casual listener is sure to find comfort in the background nature of the music at play here, and a voice this talented couldn't help but deliver an above average pop record even on autopilot. That being said, there is a wish that he'd understand the very best pop statements don't shy away from a clear personality.

For those fans of the Sea and Cake who are intrigued to hear their main songwriter develop some different ideas, this album is worth investigating. On the other hand, if you've never heard of Sam Prekop before, yet you are keen to hear some edgy and creative music made with modular synths, then this is definitely worth a listen.

At times, you catch a glimpse of a singer on the verge of something great, who is only able to suggest it due to limited time, space, or an aesthetic misalignment.

He doesn’t need to hop on the emo rap bandwagon and a more stoic presence is always welcome, but this feels like the first YG album that’s coasting on reputation rather than inspiration.

Tranquilizers is by no means a perfect record, but it is a record which shows that this is a band who have finally got the balance needed in their sound to create something arresting and fun.

Ventura feels more like a collection of songs than a fleshed-out album, but the runtime is much slimmer than Oxnard and its highs are quite a bit higher.

Overall, the first half of Outer Peace sparkles, but there is a disappointing limpness to the second part which suggests that the ideas ran out and two EPs of excellent material could have been produced instead of one album’s worth of work.

More memorable would be a complete artistic statement that’s further informed by each track. Instead, each song revels in a singular level of creativity and scattershot collaboration, driving us further away from a central theme.

She's played it safe, probably on her label's whim, when really, perilous rule-breakers would have been better suited to her lyrical style.

This is a more palatable and approachable record (even if Maguire sounds like he’s being beaten to death on ‘The Soft Hands of Stephen Miller’). But what’s missing is a lot of risk, something that each Pile record has revelled in.

Hundreds of Days is as charming as a novel unravelling a story, but it’s all over in what feels like the blink of an eye.

As If Apart will still add a few gems to your chilled out summer evening playlist, but it certainly leaves a little to be desired in regards to the evolution Cohen was clearly striving toward.

Felt is a surprising addition to their canon of work, which 2016’s Hold/Still deftly hinted they were capable of. While it may not be what long time Suuns fans are after, it’s sure to gain them some new listeners, who shall no longer feel alienated by their intense grooves.

The Greatest Gift is an appropriate accompaniment to Carrie and Lowell. A simple compilation of oddball tracks, it delivers enough to stand for itself--but is ultimately only really for the enjoyment of Stevens’ long-time fans.

Enjoyable as Drift often is, The Men are honouring their influences but not going the extra mile some of their contemporaries do to make these songs stunners.

There are a select few tracks on Lucid Dreaming that you'll be delighted to include on a party playlist, but this isn't an album that you'll be playing on loop.

The missteps are few enough they do little to tarnish what the band set out to accomplish, and the stronger songs here prove Exploded View is becoming more thrilling, ambitious and confident with each release.

Though it’s DIIV’s most consistent record so far, a step in the right direction and a more radical a gear shift than either of those releases, the tracks on Deceiver offer only wide differences in quality and little variation in style.

It's a toxic game they play throughout the 30-minute project, without ever garnering the introspection they need until things are too late.

Native Invader is a step back from Unrepentant Geraldines, but still boasts enough quality to suggest that she has another stellar album in her.

The result is a measured, wonderfully arranged, but emotionally singular album, tackling very personal feelings of doubt, pain and insecurity in a way that's easy to feel, but difficult to truly connect with.

Overall, the EP is decent, its production hearkening back to Abel’s pre-pop efforts. It brings in a range of genres and collaborators into The Weeknd’s canon but fails to truly cover new ground in the lyrics and vocal threads. My Dear Melancholy is a promising output but here’s hoping these stylistic ideas can be explored more originally on a full-length EP.

No major leaps have been made and no showstoppers have been added. An effort to buck convention make have actually just made the project slide a few steps backwards.

It just isn't a consistent !!! album. But if it's any consolation, As If is still brimming with the ecstasy and feeling of freedom that you'd expect to be promoted by the band at this stage in their near 20-year lifespan.

There's huge potential here but for every time the two of them click ('Cold Moon', 'Quiet Corner', 'No Thought Of Leaving') there's an opposite track when they feel out of sync and blunted ('Migration', 'Cold Moon', 'Roy').

I Have to Feed Larry’s Hawk is something of a messy enigma. Gone are the lo-fi production values and the urgency of early White Fence material, replaced instead by songs that take their time to grow but often miss the target. There are some aural delights here, but also too many instantly forgettable tracks.

You might absorb a couple of hooks and riffs and edit it down to your own abridged version, but you’ll be left wanting more than Krol’s willing to provide.

Though this turn towards all-out pop music doesn't breed inherently bad music (in fact, it's quite pleasant), but it's not the reason we fell in love with Dum Dum Girls.

Across eighteen tracks, no matter how long they might be, quality control is bound to be something of an issue so alongside the cracking motorik electro instrumental of 'Overtime' we do get the morose 'Women Lost In Thought' or the noise-mess of 'Missing Time' but these are small detours from what's a pretty engaging record.

We’re left with many songs that could have used some voices, or ones where the voices dominate proceedings, taking the focus away from the creators.

At its heart it is an album at odds with itself as much as it is with its audience, too weird to gain mainstream popularity, but too pop to be truly revered by existing fans.

There may be variances in sound on a track-by-track basis, but individual songs lack any real dynamic shifts and as a result this makes Transfixiation a fairly gruelling listen.

While American Utopia has its missteps it is, on the whole, a joyous record that only Byrne could make. American Utopia is an album that is inquisitive not just about the world of today but of music’s power to transport and uplift us.

The best thing you can do is let Iteration’s rain-soaked neon lights wash over and see what you feel.

Devil Music is unabashed reverence, almost innocuously so, but articulated with thunderous gravity and primitivism, if not focus. It won’t feature on many end of year lists, but it’s a helluva road trip, albeit one you’ll forget a year later.

Three albums in, and several world tours under his belt, Bombino's music remains as powerful and vital as the day he first picked up a guitar.

If you welcome the need for a slab of simple hedonistic pleasure, then you might find yourself some treasures here. Switch off and put yourself on party-autopilot.

Whilst Wilder Mind is not very good, it's really not as bad as you want it to be.

The arrangements of the album contrast between moments of minimal instrumentation, layered with her vulnerable vocal melodies that seem complementary of the overall theme. It could be felt at points that the musicality seems to move without increased colour, but it is only when you venture further into the album and the lyricism that it becomes clearer that this is likely to be understood as a reflection of the concept.

Castanets manage to keep those raw influences in sight, whilst tweaking and twisting them into something different, and at times intriguingly strange.

This album is more of a reset than a reinvention, ditching the guitar was meant to make or break them, but it's kind of done neither.

What it is, is a nice collection of dark trip-hop pop songs influenced by some great names but without forcing you to remember the name of HÆLOS. A little more substance over style will lead HÆLOS to bigger and better things.

Where some of the cuts, like 'Gitter', 'Pro Model', or 'Many Descriptions' evoke vibrant feelings, others ignite a giant pile of 'meh' inside your brain.

On the whole, it feels like this is an album we've heard before. In all fairness, they rise well above mediocrity in certain areas.

The handful of traditional band tracks that make the cut are a mixed bag.... On the whole, though, I was pleasantly surprised by Beyond Clueless; it's first of all proved Summer Camp's musical talent beyond doubt, by taking them in a direction so far removed from what they've been doing so far, and secondly lends them a little substance and credibility.

Individually, many of his tracks are great. But the album itself can feel like a concept that has been too thought out. Despite this, Mick's message is what still makes The Healing Component worth a listen.

The brevity of Lust For Youth is an issue, particularly as the eight songs fail to fully bond together, so the end result is a little too disjointed and the album overall suffers from a lack of flow, immediacy and purposeful direction. There are some good tunes here, of that there is no doubt, but it feels a little flat as a body of work.

Z is promising but it seems that SZA's identity isn't truly clear as there are too many different styles competing to be heard.

It's certainly an album that takes a little work to crack, and that work centres around Asbury's unique vocal performances.

What makes that record sound so left-field is Cedric’s all over the place vocals and Ross Robinson’s infamously loud production.

Everything on Eden more or less works, though it’s a definite step down from Ephorize.

There’s nothing wrong with harkening to ‘80s synth-pop once in a while, but it seems Wild Nothing have explored every nook and cranny of their current sound. It’s time for the incredibly talented Jack Tatum to move on to something more forward-thinking.

A touch more volume on the instruments and a bit of extra distance between one man's mouth and his microphone, this might have been a blissful exercise in studied yet clamorous rock music.

The record's very nice, but swimming alongside adequacy rather than soaring for the top isn't a wonderful career move.

So Sad So Sexy is by no means a bad record, but while the Li of previous records was refreshing and stark showing us her vulnerability, the slickly produced nature of this means that’s often lost and in its place is cliché as Li tries to hang onto the weighty romance of youth.

Songs in the Key of Animals lacks the focus of A Love Extreme, but then again, we're talking about an album that was supposedly written on the fly.

Weatherhouse houses its own experiences but could just be listened to as a sub-experience of Radiohead. It shares many of experimental shifts using beat and synths to explore mood, only without the hooks and utterly unique melodies that nobody but Radiohead can produce.

The Detroit quartet's debut album for Woodsist is at times striking and catchy, but also finds itself digging up the same nostalgia-seeking melodies that showed some promise from Bonny Doon to begin with.

The production is tidy but one note, the instrumentation resolutely professional. The vocalist has a few touchstones and reverently shifts from one to another without exactly lighting any fires of his own. Back in 1992 they would call this alternative rock.

It works well enough as a snapshot of where Everett finds himself as he approaches middle age, but the overwrought agonisation on the past and infuriatingly samey instrumental choices make it a difficult record to love.

Garbus' sound is still a little too vague, still in need of some real streamlining; the promise remains blindingly obvious, but the execution, for my money at least, is still missing.

At Best Cuckold is much like the autumnal vibe it tries to project in that, like autumn, you don't mind its existence but you kind of just want to go back to that excellent summer again.

It's a pity they remain slavishly committed to a successful template and too often Atlas feels like a memory of a memory.