The instrumentation fits perfectly with the otherworldly, thoroughly non-jazz sounds of Toral’s guitar pedal wizardry, and the absence of an expected dissonance between the two feels strangely hypnotic.

This is a new incarnation of The Julie Ruin, and it's still raising the goosebumps on my arms.

It has been worth the wait. It’s not as if music’s timeline moves in anything but circles today, so the delay doesn’t present an issue. This is the music of yesternow.

Very programmatic, AAI allows Mouse on Mars to fully flesh out their ever implicit techno-humanist sonic philosophy, a certain anarcho-progressivism with a tech-utopian bent. The record serves as a magnifying glass to their career-long preoccupations.

A Shaw Deal is an aural patchwork stitched together with the technical ability and confidence of an established sonic manipulator, but above all that – it’s a beautiful ode to friendship and music’s healing power.

There’s a cohesion and a vigour to Tick Tick Tick that may make it Mallinder’s finest and most enjoyable record in at least ten years (take a bow Hey Rube’s criminally slept on Can You Hear Me Mutha recorded with Fila Brazillia’s Steve Cobby in 2012).

Astroworld is no Rodeo or Birds In The Trap Singing McKnight, but it’s a beautiful creation of sonically striking sounds.

An album that is constantly surprising, occasionally unsettling, frequently beautiful and always mysterious.

All in all, there's enough to see and hear to make this one museum worth queuing up for.

Tender and defiant, it pays respect to its history while resolutely facing the future.

New History Warfare 2 is superfine, breathtaking, at once unnervingly exploratory and highly accessible, a record which leaves you grasping in vain for adequate reference points and peer comparisons.

It’s the product of a chronic overthinker refining his teeming thoughts into crystalline song, forming an album that doesn't shy away from the gravitas of grand gestures, and, more importantly, the emptiness that follows when they prove to be futile.

A physical and spiritual journey unravels in the 37 minutes of the record.

There are moments when the repetitive nature of some of the tracks does wear on you a little bit. ... But these are mere moments of filler on PL, an album which cements the reason why Paranoid London’s tunes appeal to a scene looking for a sound that’s rugged, dark, and illicit. And in that regard, PL has it in spades.

What is also quite impressive about this album is that amidst the dominant beats and densely textured arrangements, Georgia’s presence and her words are never shrouded. Furthermore, her openness and vulnerability throughout is immensely commanding and as you go through the tracklist, you become increasingly curious to hear where she’s at.

Fashion Week is the most vibrant and least menacing collection of tracks Death Grips have released.

Oneida prove once again that they can change course anytime they want, and the journey will remain exciting.

Wild Pendulum soars with the sounds of a band comfortable in their own skin, free of past pressures and ready to celebrate the present in magnificent style.

Coracle is a perfect soundtrack to the hazy, misty-morninged Indian summer we're enjoying. Long may it continue.

Every expansion is followed by certain randomisation of energy; some may object that album's sound is overcrowded, bringing together seemingly incompatible stylistic patterns. Too many new ideas that need to be quickly processed are restlessly thrown, but never scattered, in raw fluxus.

The result is a collection that, while it lacks the retrospective finality of the song-driven True North, a meditation on the passing of time that closed Chapman’s career as a singer-songwriter, nevertheless underscores the idea of Chapman as a guitar player who didn’t need words to express himself. And that’s no mean feat on Tuttle’s part, especially as, coming to Another Tide cold, you could easily believe it was the work of younger artists pushing into new territory.

Fortunately, It Is What It Is takes the listener’s needs into consideration by counteracting giddy one-liners heightened by energetic accompaniments with introspective ruminations coupled woven into sultry arrangements. In adjusting to the shifting sonic plains, the listener is presented with a gloriously rewarding stretch of tonal stability in the record’s third act.

The whole album is a cabinet of curiosities to discover and decipher.

This makes for what might be the most polished album in the Neubauten canon, though one band’s polish is another’s poison. There are still interjections of metal perc here (played by N U Unruh) or electric drill (played by Rudolph Moser) there, and if it’s a less dangerous record than some of its predecessors, that’s mainly in the health and safety sense.

>>> might cast an eye on the same mood-inspiration material of 70s avant rock and 80s chilled post-punk, but this album is no trite, bland replication.

There's nothing fetishistic, voyeuristic, or pathetically ambiguous here, more an outpouring of disgust that we seem to be in similarly horrendous times again. There are moments of beauty here too, of course, for that contrast has always been a hallmark of Jamie Stewart's songwriting, and what makes Xiu Xiu bleed where others merely pose.

There are a lot of different elements in the mix here – prog, reggae, folk, loungecore, even a little disco – and perhaps some listeners may initially feel a little inclined towards indigestion. However, the vision behind it all is singular and persuasive and balances its more unconventional aspects with strong harmonies and vivid lyricism.

The question of whether BRAIDS will return or not melts away in this deeply personal insight into Blue Hawaii's emotional and physical connections with one another.