Their arrangements are accomplished, and even the constant falsetto vocals are tempered enough to be pleasant throughout the album, but it's difficult to discern what exactly--if anything--Jungle actually stand for.

Despite the high quality of the arrangements, the orchestration and the recording as a whole, it is a bit too much at once. A case of less would have been more.

There's something exhausting about this manic exuberance, too. All rush and almost no plateau, it's so fidgety and full of swarming textures that it wears you down.

Trimming back their signature embellishments leaves an album that strangely is more focused sonically, but somehow aimless in intention.

Ultimately, The Endless River is another Floyd album about the inability to communicate--it doesn't "say anything" or "go anywhere", but maybe that's the point. While it's unlikely to win the band many new admirers, the casual Floyd fan will find much to enjoy here.

What could and should have been a coolly assured olympic plunge is instead a remarkably ungainly near-belly-flop of an album, weirdly devoid of the dense musicality, crooked charm and sheer kinetic potency which characterise Ghersi's works to date. ... The problem with KiCk i's particular brand of spontaneity is that it feels procedural and expository, rather than organic. It can seem, when the smoke clears here and there, a bit hollow.

After such an imposing start, the rest of My Love Is A Bulldozer was bound to struggle to keep the standards up, but even with this in mind, it's a confusing and muddled album.

Ultimately, nothing hangs together long enough to enable a consistent or enjoyable listening experience.

Watch It Die will likely comfort those already on side, but it leaves you wondering whether well-intentioned decency is enough when the world they’re responding to demands more than sanitised anger and familiar sounds.

The narrative and sonic stylings of these songs have the aesthetic qualities of intimate music, but Snaith’s anonymous intonations, sometimes bathed in layers of muddy distortion, hold the listener at a frustrating distance. Like the album’s artwork it advertises transparency, but delivers only more obscurity.

Overall i,i sounds expensive and yet – simultaneously – all too safe.

More or less everything here sounds anaemic, lacking in body, squashed, diminutive, like it could be pushed over by a strong breeze--or, worse, drowned out by light conversation on the dancefloor.

The results just feel like a watering down of his vision, leaving the listener in a strange hinterland which doesn’t leave much of an impression either way.

As Compton progresses, it rarely seems to shift out of second gear, evidently favouring laid back grooves and sparse production over aggressive break beats and G-Funk swagger. All the while an almost listless lyrical style on occasion provides a narrative, or lack thereof.... Cynicism aside, there are moments of brilliance here.

Despite its best intentions, Straight Songs Of Sorrow is an album that would’ve worked considerably better as a well-pruned EP. As it stands, there’s too much intent and not enough delivery to maintain attention throughout its sprawling running time.

This panoply of styles is both the most impressive and the most frustrating thing about Noise, the result being that only at select moments do they approach the majesty, the fists-pounding-the-ground righteousness that many have come to associate them with.

No amount of street cred can make up for this mostly middling, only intermittently marvellous record.

Padding the album with ambient interstitials would be a forgivable peccadillo were the other songs seriously weighty--after all, even Kid A had 'Treefingers'--but the remaining seven tracks can themselves come off as a little half-baked.

There are just too many occasions where Malkmus' tone bypasses droll, flies directly over kitsch, and lands way out in the rough with no hope of ever retrieving the ball.

Boys And Girls is a somewhat predictable trawl through the back catalogues of Creedence Clearwater Revival, Stax Records, Janis Joplin and the recorded output of Muscle Shoals Sound Studios amongst others, but with none of the grit, passion or emotion.

Sadly Arabia Mountain's residual nastiness and speed is pretty much gone, replaced by slow tempos and weird deviations. It's experiments with synths and disco beats that cause some of the record's truly worst moments.

So, this is not an incredible album. But in the context TLC’s legacy- as a goodbye tour to end one of the biggest girl groups of our time--there is still something touching here.

Seabed never really gets out of first gear. The general vibe given off is that of a teenager moping about in his bedroom, albeit one with the skills to emote through slick, well-produced pop music.

It's a record that doesn't undermine their body of work, but nor does it stand out as a career-defining highlight.

The album is by no means horrible, just disappointing and repetitive, chock full of revamped old school rhythms that don’t have the gratifying content to match. A good handful of songs--‘When Cats Claw’, ‘Since C.A.Y.A’, ‘Fine Ass Hairdresser’, ‘Julian’s Dream’, ‘Moon Whip Quäz’ and ’30 Clip Extension’--deserve to be judged independently.

It feels like he's taking a step back; his covers album is livelier and more creative than this, perhaps because it didn't feel the need to live up to anything.

In 2013, a Pearson Sound album would have been a great event and certainly a major step in a career already full of them, but waiting two years effectively sapped the urgency.

Like a vivid dream melting away in the first few minutes of morning, Love Letters has an uncanny beauty, but one that remains firmly out of reach.

The album is by no means horrible, just disappointing and repetitive, chock full of revamped old school rhythms that don’t have the gratifying content to match. A good handful of songs--‘When Cats Claw’, ‘Since C.A.Y.A’, ‘Fine Ass Hairdresser’, ‘Julian’s Dream’, ‘Moon Whip Quäz’ and ’30 Clip Extension’--deserve to be judged independently.

It is in that setting [an art gallery], unfortunately, which appears to be the most appropriate for The Flaming Lips’ latest release as neither the story or music are dynamic enough to hold the listener’s attention over an extended period.

There are some genuinely fun, compelling moments of music, some striking lyrics, and the smattering of modern electronic dance sounds definitely livens things up. But at an hour long, it feels too convoluted: lacking in cohesion and, ultimately, too devoid of specific intent.

The fact that BE is patchy, and solid rather than surprising in its best spots, you have to put down to a failure of nerve or drive. It's not Different Gear, Still Shit, but it is nowhere near as exciting as it might have been.

West is consistently the weak link. The musical patchwork of The Life Of Pablo is frequently--but not always--diverting in its restlessness and detail, from the abruptness with which Price is faded out on 'Ultralight Beam' to the scrawling guitars that underpin 'Feedback', probably the most straightforwardly good song on the album.

Crush Songs certainly has the consistency of intention to draw in new listeners, but for those who love the pace and grittiness of Yeah Yeah Yeahs, the end result might leave them crushing hard for the band's next record and the indefatigable side of Karen O.

Wrangler sounds neither like a Mallinder solo project (which of course they don't want to be) nor like your average electronic jam band (which they are pretending to not want to be either). If White Glue is a dance album, it only succeeds half of the time. If it is something else, it is not clear what exactly.

In Colour is ultimately too tidy and, Young Thug features aside, afraid to take risks, and is therefore all the more beige for it.

For the majority of Hymns' runtime Russell decides to play it safe and prop up Kele's uninspired musings like he's just another programmable component of an increasingly polished, synthetic entity. That the two longstanding partners can still lock together so seamlessly musically is nice and all, but it also highlights the essential ingredient missing from this half-baked album: chaos.

While World, You Need A Change Of Heart is pleasing in places, solid it certainly ain't.

There are moments where she reminds us that she can still do wonderful things, but for the most part, Artpop shows us an artist who is trying to do too much all at once.

By the album’s end, they seem to be stuck in a cul-de-sac. The next album, one hopes, will come along soon and help them out.

On Drunk, Thundercat aggressively grafts said humour onto his spacy throwback fusion r&b, and the results are mixed.

The album requires the exact right mood and setting and even then it fails to become much more than pleasant background music.

It is not boring. It is not that good. It is simply meh. The epitomeh of meh.

Guzo is a strange album--it feels like the record label (or management) are calling too many shots, unable to decide whether Yirga should play the Ethio-jazz which we've come accustomed to through the Ethiopiques series, the cool Western jazz of Oscar Peterson and Bill Evans, or a fusion in-between that also includes soul and Caribbean flavours.

Most of the album sounds like a kaleidoscope of every “indie” rock archetype, to the point that, whilst it's never debatable that Monomania is a Deerhunter record, you still find yourself thinking of Silversun Pickups, The Black Keys, The Flaming Lips or Arcade Fire, not necessarily with positive comparisons in mind.

Despite this crippling reliance on traditional psychedelic touchstones, there’s certainly a few thrills to be had on the album, and things do pick up somewhat toward the second half of the work.

Unfortunately, Girls In Peacetime Want To Dance is the net effect of an effort that goes nowhere at all; and this deviation appears furtive, as if they're trying to hide their beloved quirks from an expanded audience.

It's not all bad, and sometimes the reverse is true, with the strings the best thing about the track; the opening figure from 'A+E' is very pretty and the violin rising up in 'Cologne' is melodious and elegant, but they both give way to more of the electro-flotsam.

More of the same, then, but a productive kind of dead-end, clichés run hard into the ground.

There are some enjoyable tunes on here that might appeal to the curious who lost track of Pollard and GBV over the years. But the numerous less riveting, just-a-bit-too derivative, run of the mill rock songs will leave even newcomers with the feeling that they've heard it all before.

The title track and the genuinely brilliant ‘MetaGoth’ Stripped to the bone and not so much sung as intoned by Josephine Wiggs, this is one of the creepiest yet compelling compositions The Breeders have ever put their name to. From there on in, the album goes through a variety of fits and starts before descending into anticlimax.

To The Bone exposes and splinters insular communities and their ideas of elitism. But by observing the album through this prism alone, its real nature is obscured--that of a flawed and powerless homage.

If Par Avion wasn't so clearly aiming for the cheap seats with its ideas, it would be easier to forgive its flaws and just appreciate how great these synthesisers sound, how stunningly they're utilised.

West of Eden is a flawed album, a patchy album, and an album with some really bad lyrics in it. But nonetheless a very fun record. It might lose its magic quickly, as most of the thrill comes from the band’s willingness to skip from genre to genre, but every so often you can forget the flaws and get lost in the many worlds it tries to create.

Much of Glow is tasteful to the point of bland inoffensiveness, the sort of thing that'd suit a branch of All Bar One at half nine on a Friday night.

It's only at this point, ["Incredible Exhausted Bunny Ears"]... that Transistor Rhythm actually feels vital, resulting in in a luscious closing suite to an otherwise arid record.

All in all, though, a sort of affectlessness emerges here as one songs blend all too smoothly since, not unlike an automated playlist, the whole becomes less than the sum of its parts.

All too often the album lacks the requisite light and shade to make for a consistently enjoyable listen.

Feel The Sound, their first album since 2007, boasts the kind of incremental shifts in emphasis that no one but fans will savour.

Hype and arrogance created Watch the Throne and stifled the creative revelation it could have been. It would be nice if that could serve as a kind of lesson for the hip hop world, but somehow that seems unlikely.

This is a timid stand for a band who've made a career out of courageously embracing their fears.

Honey, when it works at least, is the sound of piecing together the night before: a love letter to not making it home, to the Tequila salt still stuck to your hand, to hands brushing under the cover of the smoke machine. Unfortunately, half of the time, it says precisely nothing and if that unquestionable potential is to be realised, Kathleen Brien has to make a choice.

The Flower Lane is far from a failed endeavour, but something special has been lost in the graduation from bedroom to studio.

The demand for our awe at an accomplished--yet unfinished--triumph is confusing. The feeling each song inspires is indeed that of a religious service, one in which the endless standing up and sitting down leaves one a little exasperated. And fatigued.

Belle And Sebastian fans have long ago learned to take the rough with the smooth and the quality control on The Third Eye Centre is all over the shop. The odd flashes of wonder within show they're still not a lost cause though.

It's clear that this band has focused too much on referencing and too little on songwriting.

Unfortunately, with an appropriately filmic, best-part's-in-the-trailer irony, it seems like Timberlake gave away too much by making 'Suit & Tie' the first glimpse of the record. From hereon in, it's a fairly dull affair.

Three good tracks [songs, "Motion Sickness," "Ends of the Earth," and "Flutes,"] do not an album make - and, unfortunately, this is the sum of the worthwhile moments on In Our Heads. Elsewhere the album is pure drudgery, remarkable only in its dullness.

There are highlights, sure (twigs is too preternaturally talented to avoid those completely), like the gleeful ‘Sushi’ or gorgeous closer ‘Stereo Boy’, but even the more compelling tracks like ‘Cheap Hotel’ – a satisfyingly eerie piece of slow-garage – would rank towards the bottom of EUSEXUA’s track-list. What’s odd is that we know twigs can do this style justice – she has an album from early this same year to prove it – so its bewildering to hear her deliver one unrewarding song after another.

Recorded in Budapest with a 40-piece string orchestra in tow, the Iris soundtrack feels far too paint-by-numbers, gathering yearning strings to ebb and flow atop xeroxed prairies of arpeggiating synths. It’s muzak for gritty thrillers, maintaining a thin soup of emotion with enough colour to paint the background without muddying the foreground.

Even without the cushy padding of Welcome to: Our House's clutch of Alex da Kid, AraabMuzik, and Hit-Boy beats, No Love Lost predictably sounds an awful lot like everything else on the radio.

One play is enough to confirm that defining moments refuse to peak through the murk.

Blake may have dispensed with some of the more experimental and emotionally obtuse trappings of his debut album on Overgrown in an attempt to engage more directly with a wider audience, but his intentions are all but drowned out by a thick glass porthole being hammered on feverishly by a dozen drowning onlookers.

The result is something of a mixed bag: moments of tender and enduring beauty broken up by landfill indie pop with a French accent.

Though their sound is undoubtedly unique, their music has become formulaic.

Without a single in sight, even by Outkast's loosey-goosey standards, Vicious Lies and Dangerous Rumors feels like three or four different records surgically stitched together illicitly by some cross-eyed back alley quack.

On the whole Body Music's tracks feel like little more than fairly unimaginative collage pieces: fifteen years of pop trends, compressed into one very indistinct style.

Even the most hardcore of Yes fans may forget that this exists in a couple months.

EP1 was a mixed bag.

The Saga Continues is lacklustre. At times it ventures into sellout territory. It’s not a terrible album (maybe I’ll add a few tracks to my ‘Chill’ playlist) but it never breaks new ground and it never touches the magic of 36 Chambers. Instead, it settles in a slightly anaemic midpoint between nostalgia and commercial compromise.

Whales And Leeches ultimately fails to capitalise upon or recapture the spirit of their previous releases.

Miss Anthropocene is a Kanye West of a listening experience. Strengthened by listening less hard and chilling out. Weakened by due diligence and the artist’s cerebral disconnect between what she's great at making and who she believes she is.

You'd think that with the weight of success behind her, Adele could, and would want to, do anything. Instead, she largely retreads the same paths and explores the same tones.

The music is satisfying for Nine Inch Nails longtime fans who get to hear old music replayed with energy – and is even fun at times – but there’s not that much to it beyond that. .... The project feels curiously unimaginative.

Hard Rain is not a bad album. It will very amiably sit, out of focus, in your field of vision as you do other things. It doesn’t, however, have whatever special something it needs to transcend the sense of a backwards referent.

As a collection of songs, Disco is a terrific soundtrack to washing the dishes or a dance-off. But this album itself underestimates its own artist, which is in a small way unforgivable.

They don’t sound like a band trying to tap into an otherworldly and infinite negation, they sound like a band trying to recreate their early power and glory.

Del Rey plays a winning strike with Honeymoon's four opening songs: powerful ballads, lain on ethereal and soft arrangements made of smooth strings and jazzy winds.... If 'High By The Beach' still can sustain its four-minutes length, the same unfortunately cannot be said for the most of the following songs.

The Big Dream is vaguely interesting, but not very interesting.

Everyday Robots signals a sea change in Albarn's oeuvre because it is, ostensibly at least, a work that tackles its creator's origins with something close to sincerity. I say close to, because there are plenty of moments here when the familiar orientalism returns to produce slightly nauseating results.

As part of Berlin's Janus Collective, M.E.S.H.'s work is very much on the hardest edges of club culture to such an extent that it becomes hard to discern any humanity at work here.

It is largely an album that, despite finding acmes in doing what Rustie does best, has more troughs than peaks, and lacks the impish, distinctive touches that made Glass Swords such a striking listen.

Phoenix gets the motions nearly right on Bankrupt, but that crucial snap simply isn’t there.

Despite the many hugely talented performers involved, Dr Dee is less philosopher's stone, and more curate's egg: a handful of fine songs where Albarn plays to his existing strengths, but mired in a sea of over-reaching folly. And ultimately, both Dee and Albarn deserve better.

In boxing up their inner fire, The Souljazz Orchestra have starved it of oxygen, so only the embers remain.

This is their pointed after-hours comedown LP, it's not enough of a disclaimer to save what amounts to an occasionally flourishing, but largely frustrating and tedious record.

There's a huge lack of definition, and even with the volume cranked high, the dynamic surge previous albums from the group have led us to expect is absent.

Continuing Hard Candy's pattern of awful try-hard title and 'show the young uns you've still got it' bangers, it's disappointing in its lack of ambition.