Be it a preemptive rebuke or not, Snares Like a Haircut is assured on its own terms, showing No Age comfortable with music for its own sake.

While it’s unlikely to have the same impact as In Colour, as the next step in the development of an eternally unpredictable artist, it’s a rewarding and frequently electrifying listen.

Humanhood spotlights a restless artist as she strives to reconcile minimalism and maximalism, all the while addressing the mysteries of self, other, and the world.

It’s a deeply engaging, consistently great release from a uniquely interesting artist. It’s just a damn shame that he’ll never get the chance to do it again.

With their newest offering, the trio traverse an incredible diversity in sound. ... The band’s ability to switch effortlessly between energetic, grunge-fuelled rock songs and sweet, emotional poignance, is something to be wholeheartedly admired.

If this all sounds a bit linear, as though Etch and Etch Deep moves like a standard plot, well, that’s because it does. There’s no film to accompany it, but that doesn’t mean Haiku Salut’s second album doesn’t make for a fantastic score, providing a subtle emotional guide as it moves from point A to point B and each stop along the way.

Silent Earthling is clearly an experiment in how to expand on a sound that is already protean and expansive by nature. It’s a difficult job, and that’s clear from listening to the record, but such is the breathtaking nature of Three Trapped Tigers that it is highly doubtful many will mind.

Before the Applause is a shattering listen, a confrontational record which violently switches genre with each song but somehow works marvellously. It's hands down the craziest album you will hear this year.

Lotz knows how to craft her work, using every moment to her advantage resulting in an album that’s an absolute indie-emo masterpiece.

The Imperial is far from a standard rulebook-revising nostalgia turn. Both the stark realism of the romance-averse blue-collar settings (here, the narrators are too busy hustling for a living to croon sugar-coated rhymes about romantic ideals) and potent musical left-turns (such as the stripped-bare minimalism of the weary-beyond-words "Roll Back My Life") make The Imperial sound thoroughly authentic, as opposed to a trip through someone else's back pages.

There’s a confidence, an appealing weirdness to Twin Heavy which looks keen to stretch the limits of the genres it might be categorised under. Completely unrestrained in his approach, and with a noticeably slick evolution since 2017’s People and Their Dogs, Willie J Healey seems set to continue in his upward trajectory of…wherever it is he feels like going next.

We see a spritz of various weapons in her arsenal, and though they may be brief snippets, they ensure that we’re not fatigued by her noise. Instead, we’d actually quite like more. A lot more.

For the most part in fact, the album’s production is curated with Cudi in mind, a sonic bag of treats for those who vibe to the gloomy, celestial exploration of his early material as well as the rap rock stylings he has demonstrated since. ... Whereas the beats on ye sounded rushed and underdeveloped, the beats on KSG have some meat on ’em, crafting a sonic mood board that evokes thoughts of psilocybin mushroom trips, spiritual healing and yes, ghosts.

They’ve slowly yet surely gathered momentum and a self-assurance which can be heard in abundance on the record: closer “Boring” is proof that Our Girl are truly in their finest form, producing a debut that is anything but.

The difference on Trouble Will Find Me is that everything feels clarified through a decade of wisdom, with volatility frequently superseded by sensibility.

Letter To Self feels like the kind of showpiece debut release that could put them over the edge. It’s a thumping statement that can challenge and charm in equal measure.

It is the sound of an artist finally getting to let loose and say the things that have stayed locked up inside for too long. In turn, Teitelbaum offers an exciting introduction to a talented songwriter and a thoroughly rewarding debut.

While the two records share an airy, ethereal DNA, The Practice of Love is a far more palatable, more replayable affair – it just doesn’t seem to hit as hard as its sister, but very few albums do.

All in all, Stage Four is an exercise in catharsis and self examination of what it means to lose someone close to you, but instead of being dragged down into a spiralling bleakness, it's is an album that ultimately feels resolutely life-affirming.

She forges a mighty hammer and her album has a thunderous resonance for our times.

Though Dust often feels like it’s dreaming, you’re nevertheless consistently reminded of its complexity and Halo’s deep cognisance of the musical language.

In the nebulous field of psychedelia, there’s plentiful room for a band as immediate and audibly exhilarated as Virginia Wing.

Chasescene will delight existing fans and lure in fresh blood with equal measure.

Like every great record, For Melancholy Brunettes fits well in its release’s social sphere. These poignant songs are as relevant as ever in the United States, now equipped with an insatiable leading figure who has become a patron saint of noxious male authority for the impressionables. It’s only a shame that the music, albeit beautifully composed, doesn’t feel as forceful as the subject.

It’s a scintillating sliver of glass to the senses – a defiant, desolate, and darkly beautiful album that commands multiple listens and highlights once more that Forest Swords is and always has been at the top of his game.

With strident chords, spiralling melodies, and a shiver inducing delivery, No Shape might spend a lot of its time searching, but in being open about that the record presents Perfume Genius at his most realised.

This is lightless, horrifically bleak electronic music, but it still sounds human despite its lack of words, melodies or analog instrumentation; there’s a tangible personality to it that’s all its own.

She has a unique capacity to include all the world’s issues in the album just by slipping in an occasional nugget of truth that punches the listener in the gut.