The palette is wider and richer this time around due to prominent contributions of guests from different parts of the world. Even as electronics, strings and horns enter the frame alongside the ever-present banjo and different types of guitars, the music retains its spacious, uncluttered freshness.

Theatrical, impassioned, and occasionally heartbreaking, Beat The Champ distills the very essence of classic Mountain Goats into another compelling album.

Though it doesn’t quite scratch the same itch for experimentation as her last album, Lanza has once again proved that she’s a forward-thinking producer with a knack for writing irresistible pop music.

Add Violence is not an obviously human piece of work; it's electronic to the point of sensory detachment, and certainly never feels like a flesh-and-blood piece.

While the record feels like a new iteration, it is also an evolution of a deeply familiar form. At the record’s core, it ultimately is more of Hovvdy and at their best, these songs envelop the listener in the same way Hovvdy songs always have.

This is, by a long distance, the most introspective work that Murphy has yet turned out, and you can feel very palpably the weight of all those anxieties he cited during Shut Up and Play the Hits.

These young Mancunians have perfected what makes pop such an addictive, essential genre, and My Mind Makes Noises is both immediate and idiosyncratic. Pale Waves’ presence may be gloomy, but their songwriting and ambition could not be brighter.

By taking a sharp turn into the light, the shades of grey of her older material have been splattered by blasts of glorious technicolour, a move resulting in her best album to date.

Her ability to craft songs that are both delicate and incredibly powerful, along with her stunning, effortless voice prevent the honesty from being alienating.

For ultimately, in true Almond fashion, this musical nod to 1960’s Italian cinema is as much tragedy as comedy. The real tragedy however would be not to check it out.

The Beyond Clueless album stands on its own merits; it is as much a soundtrack to your own memories/current experience of tennagerdom as it is to Lyne’s documentary.

In all though, Kiss Land succeeds on not only being an album in the assumed sense of the word, with big singles, tasty hooks and singalong phrases, but as a concept record too, one that takes you hostage.

The beauty of this record lies primarily in its poise and composure; that it sounds fantastic, at times, just feels like an added bonus.

Throughout this accomplished, assured new record, Lana manages to repeatedly freeze time and capture those fleeting cinematic moments that make us who we are, while reminding us of who we could be.

Optimist is unlike any other debut, as this is not an introduction but rather a fateful reckoning.

Find The Sun is an unsurprisingly great album from a curiously underappreciated artist, and an unassuming one at that. Deradoorian and her collaborators have made an album that fits the times, without knowing just how pertinent it would be.

I Won’t Care How You Remember Me marks the first true collaborative Tigers Jaw album. The result is a record that feels more emotionally nuanced than anything that’s come before it, and as such feels richer, and lusher than Spin, despite harbouring thinner production qualities.

It is music capable of helping us to navigate the world around us, and within us, with greater clarity and depth of meaning.

Here, it’s clear Ainsworth understands the importance of experimentation, building something familiar yet otherworldly.

The sounds are pure alchemy and result is pure magic. The only complaint is the length--too short at just under a half hour.

It may be shrouded in shadow, but Acts of Light is a hopeful record, rooted in intense feeling, nostalgia and desire to connect the past with the present. Woods’ talent for communicating these emotions commands a solemn and sublime respect.

In fully owning their anguish and collective past, present and future, HEALTH have yet another essential record to their name - one which fully and flawlessly embraces savagery and sincerity in equal measure.

Punisher triumphs in the joy and pathos that’s to be found in returning to its stories, where like Donna Tartt’s A Secret History, there’s always new depths, clues and answers that make you want to dive right back in.

Scott Walker is more interested in moving forward than looking back and with the soundtrack to The Childhood of a Leader his music is as unique as ever.

Wrapping the messiness of post-breakup emotions into rule-bending pop cuts, it once again proves that nobody does heartbreak anthems quite like FLETCHER.

Nature Always Wins is an ambitious album. From the understated "Meeting Up" to the sprawling and off-kilter closing number "Child of the Flatlands", it’s the sound of Maximo Park not so much maturing, as it is them evolving. And while Smith might well argue it’s the sound of them aging, there’s still plenty of life in them yet.

Fin is a record of intimacy and confidence, a rare and sumptuous combination that Syd has pulled off quite remarkably.

It’s hard to single out a standalone track from this impressive debut and this, in itself, is testament to the LP on the whole.

This is twenty seven minutes of searing punk rock, blistering guitars, brilliant singing, incredible drumming and there’s never a dull moment or weak point.

Stars Are The Light drifts unassumingly in a dreamlike state and although the key component of all of their albums up to this point is relegated to atmospherics, it’s a transition which has been made with ease.

Whilst Bowler Hat Soup does come across as a little mashed-up at times, that’s its charm.

It’s steeped in Haitian history, it’s an exploration, an education, and a hugely personal accomplishment.

This is a record that is highly sonically ambitious, and even the moments that don’t quite come together are carried by Beyoncé’s vocal talents and sheer star power.

for you who are the wronged is a beautiful, at times overwhelming, journey through a cruel world that robs and violates us all of something. It doesn’t passively sit by and let the worst happen though – it comes bearing offers of strength, hope, and companionship to those in need.

It’s safe to say Wilson is feeling a little bit country, a little bit rock and roll on Dixie Blur, and as with his other albums, the stylistic tweaks fit him like a glove.

The six-piece have retained a strong sense of the wonderfully free spirit improvisers they are on stage, but with Youth and Ben Hillier on production duties there is a more refined focus to their output. 100% Yes in turn deserves greater focus from the world at large.

On Sunset could be viewed as an album reinstating Weller as the keeper of mod musical tradition, but it’s also an album that sees him taking a rare glance into the rear-view mirror as he speeds into the '20s.

Tracks are also structurally diverse. Fans expecting an album stacked with back-to-back bangers, as Nights Out (2008) and The English Riviera (2011) are, will be caught off guard. Instead Mount gives his creative muscles space to flex wide, sandwiching catchy hits between mysterious soundscapes and zany instrumentals.

The album details not just a break-up, but a shift in how relationships and human connection work in modern times.

Ghostemane’s ANTI-ICON is a feverish collection of voices pitted against a genre-blending backdrop of visceral noise. Taking heavy music to a whole new level is something only an anti-icon could do, and Ghostemane’s firecracker of a new record achieves just that.

The musical tailoring is both electric and refreshingly liberating, with rich textures and stark contrasts. Always perfectly balanced, with a minutely tuned on and off switch that also leaves room for silence.

7 Days takes care of business, providing 11 tracks of club-ready beats, guaranteed to get any crowd hyped.

Much like its predecessor, GENE fuses flights of accessibility in parallel with the unorthodox, achieving a split-tone depth that at once evokes a murky, warbling uneasiness and in equal measure boasts splashes of untroubled psych-pop brilliance. Earworms deployed in quick succession, Dust helms familiar inventiveness and ingenuity that can sometimes feel a rarity.

t's ultimately perhaps telling that the most compelling departures from set templates are more naturally aligned with the territory of Washington’s past triumphs.

Ironically for an album so deeply immersed in the past and the all-enveloping shadow of a famous parent, the album provides that Dury’s talents require no piggybacking on anyone else’s fame: this is the real deal.

Remain Calm’s 13 tracks pass in a brief 28 minutes, the shortest of these contorted vignettes lasting just the same number of seconds. Each is it its own entity, a different shade of light and colour, a different lifeworld entirely.

It definitely helps that You and I are Earth sparkles with Savage’s most direct, open and unabashedly beautiful music to date.

There’s no rap entitlement on display, and even brand-dropping doesn’t feel disingenuous or superficial, somehow--and, furthermore, she’s a grounded everyman rap icon. It’s endearing to no end.

Devour overall is a punishing, malicious force of a record, one focused entirely on the eradication of any sense of self and musical procedure, with no room for reprieve. It perfectly captures the raw, hemorrhaging nature of Chardiet’s thematic intention, and live performances and in this way it is nothing short of an unbridled success.

Whilst Laurel Hell doesn’t necessarily feel like a new Mitski album, her talent as a songwriter is strong enough to support these new contexts to her storytelling. Her cleverly crafted lyrics captivates listeners without ruining her enigmatic persona.

It’s a glorious return from one of 2010s most talked about bands that deserve to be talked about all over again.

Love You To Death is a really, really good pop record.

There isn’t a weak track on the album--just varying degrees of excellence.

Overall All Yours proves that taking a little time out to breathe can work, and this airy record captures that feeling.

Barragán‘s casual atmosphere sees Blonde Redhead at their most laid back.

With cinematic soundscapes of art-rock in tow, Headful of Sugar is a heavenly ride that actively embraces a full spectrum of feeling; from self-destructive tendencies to the saccharine thrills of youth.

This new LP doesn't really break new ground in the same way. It does flesh out his personality and provide substance behind the flashy pop showmanship though, and that's not something to be undervalued.

This 33-minute introduction to the next evolution of Scowl answers a question posed on their debut: “I just wanna know, is this how flowers grow?” The answer is yes. They bloom and blossom into something wonderful that still has a heap of potential ready to sow.

Although refreshing, the many influences of the second half are quite a hard contrast to the first ten tracks, whose productions are meditative and intuitively balanced. Although there are constantly new elements appearing, the crisp tracks never get overcrowded, giving the project a luxurious finish.

If NEVER ENOUGH proves one thing, it's that Turnstile has a bright blue horizon ahead of them. The sky is the limit now.

The Last Dinner Party don’t leave one dramatic stone unturned. Pleasurably satisfying, you can’t help but come back for more.

Each track will commit to Whack’s usual first minute, but suspiciously lingers on, sometimes embellishing an idea and other times letting the same moment marinate on repeat. This often does little to diminish the power of each particular song, but on the macro-level, the record is still a collection of fleeting snapshots, albeit with high resolution and long-term fidelity.

There’s a human element to the record, missing from so many of their contemporaries’ efforts, waiting to be engaged with for those who choose to scratch beneath the surface; for everybody else, Blood Red Shoes will simply be the riotously fun sound of a band who have well and truly cast off the shackles.

Park Hye Jin has single-handedly constructed a safe and supportive space for the introverted, sad, and disillusioned — a purely compassionate space put together by a single and inevitably singular talent for other lonesome souls to dance their sadness away.

The sense of place that Yumi Zouma finally seems to have found on Willowbank brings an album that’s bristling with energy, albeit one that does feel overstuffed. And yet, even in the face of that, it’s hard not to be swept away by Willowbank.

Like recent releases by Robyn or Solange, this expansive and beautiful record shows Vagabon as an expert at creating pleasure and soulful reassurance from electronic pop – a surprising but welcome heelturn.

Kannberg-led songs on Pavement albums were always immediately identifiable not just for his voice, but also for their lack of lyrical obfuscation. His perspective remains direct and perhaps more openhearted than ever.

The recipe for their success is straightforward, but they do manage to indulge in some more experimental desires by pushing Geronimo’s voice to the margins of the mix on tracks like the psychedelic “Bird’s Eye.”

SUGAREGG is not without its moments of doubt and misfires. Regardless, it’s a product of its context, an artefact indicative of a change in intent and perspective by its creator. It’s a product full of joy, not maddening, but genuinely uplifting and encouraging. It’s also the best thing Bognanno has written.

Each listen helps to start piece together the overall shape of the album, something which remains a little shrouded throughout. But its length, and depth, is also Persona's strength. An album to get lost in and to discover bits of wonder along the way.

Overall, Cut and Paste is a fine collection of Oscar’s old lemons made into lemonade--it’s refreshing pop music, but with a floppy fringe and a tote bag.

Tin Star doesn’t play around with the formula, but it’s much better off rollicking through a hot-blooded, swinging set than it is attempting to be some kind of self-conscious alt-indie crossover.

A vibrant and digestible yet existential and thought-provoking treat.

It’s light years ahead of anything Goodman turned out with Vivian Girls; she’ll never be the world’s most original songwriter, but the opportunity to let both her vocals and her guitar breathe is one that’s already paying dividends.

We are treated to a collection of refreshingly care-free and up-tempo punk; well-crafted and not at all pretentious.

Settle is a soulful, accomplished and versatile record.

While it might sometimes lose that heart, when it rediscovers its path again, it becomes an incredibly immersive and exciting album.

State of Ruin is as successful in embracing the genre's menace as it is subverting it, revelling in the fist-pounding and neck-snapping as much as dream-like and beatless. All in all, a solid debut.

A collection that isn’t going to win over the world but might just help you make more sense out of it.

Ride The Black Wave is both a joy to listen to and a pain to consider critically: The type of music they’re playing could realistically be called superfluous or superb, depending on your level of engagement with it; the tunes could be called plagiaristic or panoptic depending on your state of mind when you’re listening to them.

Chalk it up as another transitional album of sorts; Love Yes has TEEN well on their way if they’re not already there.

On their debut, Delmer Darion present an album that can be enjoyed studiously through exploring its depth and archival references, but more importantly they have simply created 44 minutes of music that sounds like it is from a new world as beautiful as it is strange.

Alix is not a perfect album--Widmer and Joyner’s vocals still prove an acquired taste and while better balanced than previous efforts, the duo could still use a wider dynamic. However, it does arguably prove that Generationals’ bread and butter lies on the poppy side of the fence, this perhaps their most cohesive statement to date, and their yellow brick road’s poppy fields appear to serve only to revitalize.

Western Stars is simply a classy record from a man growing increasingly comfortable with his status as an elder statesman of classic rock. And I absolutely cannot wait to listen to it in a car.

First Demo reinforces the impression that this particular band never really set a foot wrong; they sound more assured here, with just ten performances under their collective belt, than many bands longer in the tooth do in a lifetime.

Richard D James still manages to be one of electronic music’s most captivating producers, and even if this does not have quite the same effect on the listener as much of his other work, it still feels far more engaging and accomplished than a simple genre exercise.

Push/Pull is brimming with stellar cuts. Every track is an intriguing mess, a cavalcade of hodgepodge elements that when smooshed together, far from sounding like a steaming dump, are riveting.

It’s thirty five years of dance music history wrapped up in a glorious fifty minutes and with Whang at the helm, it’s encased with an icy sheen, impossible to resist.

The Jesus and Mary Chain are trapped in amber on Damage and Joy, untouched by the very different musical climate to the one they last sent an album out into. Good job, then, that it contains far more hits than misses.

This is a record that shrugs off some of the grandiosity of America and instead offers more detail and smaller, more nuanced yet easily interpreted emotions within a relatively familiar context.

As Brun has demonstrated over these last two records, whether experimenting or sticking closer to home, she remains essential listening.

Overall though, this is a special album, and a real accomplishment. To make a record largely of solo violin music with songs played as impeccably as this, but have the performance itself not be the focus, is remarkable.

It may be a relatively short listen, which can easily breeze past you if you don’t pay attention, but Swim Inside the Moon is a warning shot, a sign of things to come. This is just the beginning for Angelo De Augustine--an artist full of potential.

Everything is presented with a glossy sheen which may prove too much for some, especially fans of arguably their best album, 1998’s underrated and unloved Adore, and as with every other Pumpkins album, it’s hard to see where Corgan and Chamberlin end, and the other players begin. Yet if you weren’t expecting much from this latest attempt at keeping the band alive, you'll be impressed at how revitalised they sound.

On balance, Music For Dogs kind of ends up resembling a bag of chocolate misshapes: weird-looking and questionable, but still somehow oddly loveable.

On first listen, the absence of a nihilistic mantra to grasp onto may disappoint fans, but the deceptively simple pleasures of Honey open up with each listen. Robyn is trusting her instincts; finding care and wonder in the spaces she once went for punishment.

It’s an album that sets out to excite and take risks and be messy. Alternately visceral and cerebral, and building with a whole new set of tools, UMO’s second release this year feels like a band bursting from their bubble; saying plenty about both Nielson’s fevered creativity, and the future of his cherished project.

Modulating between grandiosity and relative constraint helps to root the band’s sound in an eerily-wrought hinterland; a template that deters the fabled afflictions of second album syndrome, securing itself as a credible successor to their spry breakout debut.