Lord Steppington is arguably his finest since Domo Genesis' No Fools mixtape, certainly an album on which his production is more freewheeling than it has been in a while, noisier, angrier, determined.

Temples then. A bit retro--check. Noel Gallagher and Johnny Marr likes them--check. Singer has amazing hair--check. A debut album chock full of references to their sources, but elegantly reformed and futureproofed--check.

Even if Have Fun With God occasionally meanders or strips its source material back a little too far, its value lies in the way it extends the course of Dream River (which itself sounds like a continuation of Callahan's 2011 magnum opus, Apocalypse)

Pangaea's Fabriclive is the much needed and triumphant reboot the format's needed, istilling something of club music's ongoing renaissance into a seamless, pounding missive. Every act is one to watch and discover, but at this point none deserve to be followed as closely as Pangaea himself.

The mastery of Moodymann is its ability to consider and celebrate a rich cultural past whilst simultaneously providing a localised image of what an intimate, cathartic and utopian electronic music could look like.

This is a deliberate Difficult Listen, an Atrocity Exhibition, an Intense Humming Of Evil. If you've always been a Stewart-skeptic, there's a good chance you'll dismiss this as Super Hans conjuring a powerful sense of dread; if not, it's likely to genuinely unsettle.

Occasionally there are pedestrian moments, as on the drifting 'Pill Hill Serenade', where the vitality dims and the sombre tone can feel wearing, so taking it all in is best staggered over several listens.

Terrestrials should first be seen as a meeting of chameleonic polyglots, and the result is most unexpectedly beautiful and luminescent.

Simply put: this is the artistic culmination of the last five years in the world of Adam 'Nergal' Darski and with integrity and quality like this, in combination with his uncanny ability to position his band on solely his terms, it's a match made in heaven. Or hell.

Built around harmonies that only siblings seem to muster, there is a neat balance struck between angry noise from self-enforced isolation and a pastoral quality that strikes into the heart of America in a direct bloodline from CSNY and The Band.

This is a record which exerts a demand upon everyone who listens to it, not simply in its abrasive textures but in the fundamental questions it raises about the worthwhileness of persevering.

It's perhaps unfortunate that Guardian Alien fall into the cliché of extended, trippy freak-out at the last moment, as Spiritual Emergency toys with as of yet unheard musical syntax, touching upon some peculiar motifs and hinting at perhaps full future maturity and subsequent greatness.

This a welcome shot of vitamin D in the cruellest month of the year where summer seems to be an eternity away while the filling of tax return forms only adds to the harshness of January.

After the assimilation of the band into the mainstream rock pool with New Wave and White Crosses, their decision to make a stellar pop-punk record, judged on the quality of its hooks, is a great linear move. 'Blues is a palette cleanser that still causes a ruckus.

Köhncke walks the thin line between pop and kitsch and remains focussed throughout Justus Köhncke & The Wonderful Frequency Band, which is his finest yet, and one of the best of 2013. Fernweh techno of the highest order.

Rave Tapes may not be their definitive album, and even if that never comes, it adds another clutch of undeniably brilliant songs to their arsenal. The hawk is very much still howling.

Recorded last October, and with producer Gil Norton (who produced the band's final three albums) back at the helm, EP2 immediately delivers.

EP1 was a mixed bag.

In Warpaint, they've mastered the mid-tempo come-on, being to indie rock what Aaliyah was to R&B.

An often fairly classicist pop record which nods heavily towards naggingly familiar influences, yet doesn't feel like it could exist at any other time than now.

Perhaps its on-the-hoof, anomalous nature is the source of a sense that High Hopes, though good, doesn't feel either like a set of surprising others sides or quite as cohesive or great as the title of 'new Springsteen album' (as opposed to say 'iTunes bonus tracks', or 'B-side collection', which might have been more fitting categories) might demand.

Crucially, this is an album lacks cynicism and one that bathes in a love of its antecedents so deep that the final results are as seductive and mesmerising as their live show.

Luckily, the balance of ideas and effort that run throughout Surrender show a band back in top form after long spell off, perhaps the best of their decade plus existence.

This isn't Minneapolis blowing mind after mind in the mad rush, this is the groundwork, the early experiments, the demos en route to the full on experience. Drums sometimes barely sound there, mixes are merely what can be done with the tools to hand, it's not slapdash but it's not slick either.

They function as compassionate anthems that rally against the wrought iron tempestuousness of youth.

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.

It is a bold, expansive body of work that should have all the praise heaped on it because, without warning, she dropped one of the strongest albums of the year on us.

The Remainderer slots into a lineage of interim records that bridge different eras of The Fall, like the sprawling ‘Chiselers’ single, which telegraphed a darkening of mood in the mid-90s, or the Fall Versus 2003 EP, which signalled the band’s reinvigoration after career-low Are You Are Missing Winner?