With its serene harmonies and Byrdsy jangle of arpeggiated guitars, “Quiet Corners & Empty Spaces” heralds the most potent Jayhawks album in ages, with some of Gary Louris’s best songs captured at their sweetest by producers Tucker Martine and Peter Buck.

For all its gloom, Merrie Land is an entertaining and theatrical album, with vocals that capture the social observation of early album Parklife. It’s also an immensely clever feat of word painting, never relying on lyrics alone to reflect the sense of anxiety.

Merging deft production with stark, diary-entry songwriting on opener 'Too Much Love' (for dancing in low light with strangers) the south London electronic trio find a balance between melancholic subtext and the thrill of a beat you can sway to.

The group’s most ambitious work yet. ... Elsewhere, “The 55 Quintessence” castigates “fascist terrorists with hashtags”, while a modicum of counterbalance is provided by the romantic throbs of “Julian’s Dream” and especially “Effeminence”, a hypnotically shuffling, sensuous piece which demonstrates that Quazarz is just as vulnerable to the lure of the ladies.

Beautiful, blissful melodies are buried in there.

72 Seasons may not see Metallica doing anything new – but it does find their old machine firing on all cylinders. Old and new fans alike will be headbanging happily throughout.

Even when he strains to keep in key or pitch, he manages to make a virtue of his shortcomings, bringing a sense of long-distance exhaustion to “All The Way”, and applying a sort of Gallic shrug to “All Or Nothing At All”, in stark contrast to the jauntier tone of Frank Sinatra’s and Billie Holiday’s interpretations.

A warm and inclusive record.

What's not in doubt is how faithfully he's stuck to the core deep-soul verities, with a delivery that vaults from spoken sermonising to raw, impassioned hurt in an instant.

London Grammar seldom grab you by the collar; they’re thoughtful middle-class kids making tasteful pop landscapes. If you’re chatting in the car, odds are you might not even notice that Reid is pouring her heart out. But if you’re driving alone, she is capable of breaking yours.

JD McPherson’s Let The Good Times Roll was one of the most joyously unvarnished rock’n’roll delights of recent times, and this follow-up continues that album’s ingenious blending of heritage and modernity, sometimes recalling The Black Keys’ reliable way with chunky groove and quirky hook.

Prine’s stance has stayed askew. Yet these songs are solid like good chairs you can settle into for a while.

Versions of these 10 tunes have already come out in the relentless flood of confusing, multi-format material that flows from Young’s archives .... One of the USPs of this release is that these are all original 1977 mixes, making it maddeningly essential for completists.

David Longstreth’s account of his separation from former bandmate Amber Coffman told through a welter of autotuned, over-treated vocals and jumble of clashing sounds that, to be generous, may be intended as an analogue of the ground shifting beneath their disintegrating relationship.

These 10 songs are like soundings from between the cracks, faint echoes from an inveterate wanderer whose revulsion at our anthropocentric ruination of the world leads him to ever-darker places.

I suspect both the artist and her critics push too hard for her to find one true self. Whereas this record sees her rattling between a range of identities, it’s still a lovely bunch of Keys.

On their tribute to The Everly Brothers, Bonnie “Prince” Billy and Faun Fables' Dawn McCarthy avoid the obvious hits in favour of more unfamiliar items from the brothers' repertoire.

The result is a fine album, subtly varied in both musical style and lyrical slant.

Opening with urgent triplets, it settles into an elegant braiding of interlaced lines that push the music forward in waves.

There’s a sway to the melodies that slip around you, supportive but unassuming, like an old friend’s arm around the waist.

At times it does play like the soundtrack to a rather pretentious spa – but Cellophane Memories snuck up on me with its subtle, synthy scrapbooking. Slyly seductive stuff, if not Peak Lynch.

The fingering and virtuoso touches, the deft harmonics, the subtle string-bends are all delivered with minimal fuss throughout, whether it's a solo piece like the wistful "Dery Miss Grsk", the Bach transposition "Cello Prelude In G", which works so well with his instrument or the jaunty ragtime of "Ugly James".

The occasional cut slices through the general blandness--the lilting “Shades Of Blue” is a winsome folk-pop lollop, and the Neu! motorik groove gives “For You Too” a rare drive--but overall this seems more escapist than reactive, not much help at all.

Rufus Wainwright believes this to be "the most pop album" he's ever made, and he's probably right, so long as you're thinking 1970s pop.

The Staves are like a distillation of all that's best about the folk heritages of England and America.

The issues she covers are complex at times--“Called You Queen” recounts a problematic period partnering a gay man, “before your body betrayed you”--but “Blue Diamond Falls” closes the album on a positive note, affirming feminist possibilities that “you can be whatever you like”.

If you’re looking for connectivity between the tracks, it’s difficult to find it through the array of hyperactive noise. However Reznor and writing partner Atticus Ross managed to create their own version of The Matrix.

Tension II feels bolder, tougher and more inventive than its predecessor, while still flowing directly from the same fun and fizzy vibe.