The hazy, dream-pop vibe mixed with piano bar works. Take a listen. Soon you'll be lost in the worlds of melancholy and the sublime.

Everything Else Matters is an inventive, often genuinely exciting blend of noise and pop sensibilities not really heard since the early days of Lush.

Menace Beach’s Black Rainbow Sound is one of the most accessible and thrilling noise rock albums out there at the moment, and it's not even close.

Crab Day is an idiosyncratic and imaginative record, with fresh highlights appearing on every listen.

Far from diving deeper into the bleak, sonic maelstrom that has characterised most of their work, Pe'ahi is their most open, emotional record to date.

While it is a solid, if unspectacular debut with promise for the future, it's difficult to fight the feeling that Before We Forgot How To Dream is an album which hides behind big production because it is afraid to be intimate.

The Way And Color is an admirable, solid effort, surely paving the way for better material on the not so distant, sunset dripping, horizon.

It ultimately comes up short on tapping into the kind of emotional depth needed to resonate beyond feeling like those brief moments when we find ourselves experiencing a sudden case of deja vu before snapping back to reality.

This is more a record for hardcore fans than casual ones, though there are some distinct highlights.

Their efforts were actualised in a catchy album that makes you want to dig deeper and discover what they are trying to say lyrically and musically.

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.

Every element of Close to the Glass feels like it has been minutely polished; like the workings of a miniature pocket watch, it all feels succinct, gleaming and fresh.

Destroyer feels like a band waking up from the slumber rut that marred their more recent output. There is a distinct sense of urgency here, of the adrenaline felt with a new experience that always seemed previously out of reach. McBean has (fuel) injected an exigency to this project once again, and the results are great.

They haven't reinvented Christmas music and made it respectable, but it's infinitely more palatable than anything else you're going to hear for the next month.

Mystery Hour is a wistful, weird collection that shows once again that break up songs are the best.

The comforting warmth of cassette fuzz binds itself to the entire work, making the gamble an intimate experience akin to anything that Nils Frahm has laid his hands on. This has allowed nonkeen to find the perfect balance between experimental and familiar.

Through their highly freeform but affectionate collaboration, the trio consistently accentuates the potency of the passion in the songs.

It is polished in the sense everything has a place. Sleek track productions can’t hide the energy rattling in the bones of the band. They were able to bottle and utilize the catchiness found in electro-pop and showcase the best of those elements when applied to a rock band eager to branch out.

With Elephants on Acid they often sacrifice, clearly by choice, catchiness for a more avant-garde complexity. There is a fantastic set of songs awaiting murkily on Elephants on Acid, and for Cypress Hill's intended audience here--the true fans--it's sure to be a joy unearthing them.

This is a slick, polished rock album with a clear lineage from bands such as L7, Sleater-Kinney and Celebrity Skin-era Hole to more contemporary acts such as Du Blonde, Dream Wife and Pip Blom.

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

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.

White and Mosshart's collaboration feels like a tale of the proverbial nearly men--close, but no cigar.

Heads Up feels like an album bound to be forgotten.

On Bermuda Waterfall, Savage has taken a real step forward, proving beyond reasonable doubt that he's a fine songwriter; he just needs a little more instrumental refinement, and perhaps a slightly more nuanced understanding of his strongest vocal suit, before he's truly mixing it with the big boys of throwback pop.

Thankfully, rather than this coming across as some comprehensive grave robbery, Greys have added enough of their own ingredients to concoct quite the powerful brew.

King’s Mouth has moments of pure joy and feels timeless in many ways, and for that Coyne and co. should be applauded.

Not outstaying its welcome (a common problem for samplers that peddle transcendent music which can occasionally feel like it is treading water), there is a good diversity of experiments, albeit largely backed by familiar themes.