Variably groovy and often catchy, Hyperdrama represents a marked improvement in Justice’s output. It’s easy to see why the band have had such a hard time topping Cross, however: Generator, the album’s strongest track, proves they’re still at their best when they stick to the sound that put them on the map 17 years ago.

That this is Manson’s most accessible and focused album in years counts for very little; there is simply no shock value when all you have to offer are cheap shocks.

There’s nothing wrong with these songs, exactly – innocuous fare that’s catchier than you want it to be – but they’re a far cry from Pink’s attitude-laden early hits: misfit anthems about depression and divorce that elbowed her a place in the mainstream.

Reputation is a big, brash, all-guns-blazing blast of weaponised pop that grapples with the vulnerability of the human heart as it is pummelled by 21st-century fame.

There’s so much to enjoy here for long-standing fans – a mellow soundtrack perhaps for the four-wheel pilgrimage down to Glastonbury, with some fittingly thought-provoking messaging on automotive responsibility going forwards.

It may be nothing more than an exercise in maintaining the brand of the 21st Century’s most vacant superstar but, in its perfectly distilled empty pleasures, Glory might just be Britney’s masterpiece.

The quality wanes a little in the album’s second half, but there are four or five bangers, all told – ample firepower to win fresh converts while supporting both Harry Styles and Arctic Monkeys on the stadium circuit this summer.

The son of Richard Thompson is capable of writing his own striking lyrics but sometimes they are straining a little too hard.

A chamber piece that spills blood all over the hotel carpet, Room 29 is an understated triumph.

The playing is lovely, lilting and delicate.

It is all quite delightfully nuts.

From Out of Nowhere could be an ELO album from 40 years ago, albeit with a bit of added digital polish.

Cleverly, the arrangements draw attention to what richly layered songs Basement Jaxx have.

Easier to admire than to care deeply about, Youth should confirm his status as the go-to rapper for people who don’t really like rap music.

On the pulsing, electronic slither of Vendetta X, on which Astbury speaks menacingly of “sucking on a dirty blade”, it’s closer to his work with Unkle than stadium rock. In these moments, and on the glorious, closing title-track, Under The Midnight Sun is brilliant. For much of its second half, however, its magic doesn’t catch quite so well.

Muse's rather absurd spaceship may be welded together from bits of other acts--but it still flies.

It’s certainly delightful and delicious – as they croon on opening track De-Lovely – although also decidedly undemanding.

Inevitably, the singer’s less appealing views do invade the material.

There are a couple of lesser chug-alongs, but mostly it's as good as anything in the Motörhead canon.

There is an avant garde boldness here that is, at times, quite amazing.

Fans will find much to enjoy here, but it might be time for Knopfler to push himself out of his comfort zone.

There are a few tracks that could be spicier (Envy the Leaves, At Your Worst), but overall, Silence Between Songs seems like the album Beer has been wanting – and waiting – to make for a long, long time.

Sparsely arranged around piano, guitar and his gruff vocals, it's sombre, but affecting.

Thematically tight, thought-provoking and packed with tunes, it is, once again, far in advance of most pop in 2011. What a way to go.

It is as self-indulgent as Seventies progressive rock, albeit filtered through a 21st-century indie-rock sensibility that keeps things taut and edgy, with virtuoso posturing at a minimum.

An extraordinary debut from a new British-based band who combine a gipsy swagger with tremulous sensitivity and gothic rock drama.

It's nice. A bit boring. The melodies are likeably predictable, warm and gentle.

It is another fine album from one of the country’s finest singer-songwriters, quietly but productively ploughing his own fertile furrow.

Overall, there's less headbanging potential here than on their finest moment – 2001's Grammy-winning song Boss of Me from Malcolm in the Middle – but it doesn't matter. This is still a brilliant summer listen.

Bright character studies of predatory women, manipulative gurus, sleazy lotharios and outdoor sex fiends are peppered with non-sequiturs that force listeners to fill in gaps.

SERPENTINA isn’t a coherent whole but rather a doggerel and ill-considered mishmash of disparate parts.

Madame X sounds like three different albums fighting for space. There’s the Latin pop album, in Madonna performs straight-up sexy dance duets aimed at the world’s fastest growing music market. There’s a strand of trendy, low-slung, sensitive trap pop that lacks the majestic swagger you expect from a grand dame of the game. And neither of these elements sits comfortably alongside the Mirwais spine of fizzy art pop marrying mad production with inflated lyrical themes. Madonna says she is fighting ageism but she is fighting on too many fronts at the same time.

Over 13 songs, it’s almost impossible not to fidget and move to glitchy drum’n’bass (Kammy), dreamy dub-step (Bleu) or echoey R’n’B-meets-soulful house (Kelly). Fred has done it…(dare we say?) again.

From the headlong punk-meets-acid-house charge of Ill Ray (The King) to the stadium campfire singalong of Put Your Life on It, Kasabian deliver hooks, headshots and upper cuts in a barrage of punchy sounds and aggressive attitude.

The results rate with his best work, by turns reflective and attacking, on which lyrics sparkle and music breathes and flows with a sure touch.

As with previous Tarantino soundtracks, this is an enjoyable, carefully constructed set, throwing up more hits than misses--and the occasional gem--but ultimately its songs will be brought to life on the big screen.

It is an ambitious and technically impressive album grappling with big themes of love in a time of disaster. Lyrically, though, it is all a bit prosaic, whilst O’Brien’s voice is pleasant but lacking the kind of distinctive tone and delivery that makes you want to pay attention.

Nothing you’re hearing here is particularly cutting-edge, but it’s delivered with such ebullience and pomposity that you almost forget that this isn’t the first time you’ve heard an 808 beat.

With Mirrorwriting Woon proves to be a genuinely exciting British soul star in the making.

The title From Zero suggests a band starting again. That’s not strictly true. But it sounds like a thrilling second chapter.

Mayer’s songs about bruised male egos, damaged hearts and hard-earned life lessons conjure up slow motion sequences from a long-lost John Hughes movie. It really is Some Kind of Wonderful.

This CD won't replace the originals but it's a tribute with some memorable versions of great songs.

Mike Bub (bass) and Kenny Malone (percussion) make up the tight musical unit on 13 enjoyable songs, which were recorded in Nashville.

All 12 tracks are undeniably well-made and catchy songs, but it veers into all-too predictable territory in places.

The mix of trap grooves and synth balladry is perfectly of the moment, lacking the boldness of a truly original talent. Yet there is something appealing in the sweet melodies and sour attitude of a singer who sounds like she might actually be starting to enjoy herself.

Ultimately it amounts to two decent tunes in the singer-songwriter pop idiom, padded out with angsty filler and hot air.

Rap has been around for four decades now, and you might have hoped it would have evolved beyond this kind of backwards, deeply misogynist, abusively macho, greed- and status-obsessed posturing.

She wants to deliver good, solid, heartfelt slabs of it. And on those terms, her fifth studio album is her best record in years.

A sense of sisterhood is a huge part of Haim’s appeal, yet the humorous camaraderie and rocky swagger they present on stage all but vanishes in the studio.

Chopped and diced from a variety of sources, it packs a lyrical punch, but nothing here transcends his internet hit.

This is an album in which Mumford embraces and forgives his own, to deeply moving effect.

Less successful is spongy new song One Heart, One Voice, on which Streisand, Ariana Grande and Mariah Carey ladle up sickly sweet lyrics and vocal sprinkles about onto the bland whipped cream and jelly of a sub-Disney love trifle. .... Bob Dylan makes more effective conversational space for himself on the 1934 jazz standard The Very Thought of You – the five o’clock stubble of his devoted rasp leaning into her silky sass as a breezy harmonica blows a fresh dynamic through the old tune.

Views genuinely makes for mesmerising listening, even if much of the album seems to consists of lazy meanders through Drake's psyche.

Built around pianos and acoustic guitars, with lots of strings and harmonious backing vocals, it feels sleek but self-contained, akin to a Carole King album glossed up for modern listeners.

At times his roar-throated tone gets repetitive, but Denver singer/songwriter Esmé Patterson adds subtle vocal contrast on the haunting Silent Key.

The Third is a hot, sweet pancake stack of danceable tracks, drizzled with drama and swung by a terrific horn section.

High Flying Birds is the best collection of Gallagher tunes since his Morning Glory days.

Her second album, however, belatedly delivers on all Goulding's latent promise.

His voice has never sounded better, but it’s the lyrics that let the album down overall.

It can be a little underwhelming but it is music with its heart in the right place.

Throughout, the music remains a bit distant. It’s as though Hakim, despite all he feels, is making a comment on the otherworldly and ineffable nature of love. Like a kite itself, love doesn’t stay still. It floats, moves and pulls you in different directions. Just like this collection of songs.

The result is a quirky and poignant little time capsule.

Mildly soulful, rarely unpalatable, the Chili Peppers keep delivering American fast-food for the ears, even as they enter their sixties.

In the past decade, it seems Jones has made a sneaky transition from dinner party backdrop to David Lynch soundtrack.

It Won’t Always Be Like This amply demonstrates that there is more to Inhaler than family resemblances.

While it is less commercially focused, there is no discernible drop of quality on the expanded Anthology, crammed to bursting with beautifully worked songs that add different shades and angles to her essential premise of a woman working out why her love life has left her in such emotional tatters.

By re-recording the whole of Taylor Swift's 1989, the maverick alt country star has turned a world beating chart smash album into a tender masterpiece of bruised Americana, in the process emphasising the perfect songcraft and exposing the dark heart of emotion beating beneath Swift's gleaming surfaces.

These abandoned sessions probably would have been ignored had they been released when first recorded. But to ears and sensibilities realigned to Cash’s brilliance, this really is a lost treasure.

It's an album marinated in sadness, so much so that in places it veers into the maudlin, but Harris's poetic steel usually saves the day.

When they're playing to their strengths, the 1975 provide a robust platform for Healey’s witty, romantic, confused yet always committed interrogation of the essential artifice of his role as reluctant rock star with a conscience, shouting into a void already filled with the echoes of other voices. Like many double albums, there is a fine single album here fighting to get out. If only.

There is the odd failure (23 is a saccharine ode to her husband, the footballer Gerard Piqué), but Shakira still traverses musical styles like few others.

FLO’s debut has one glaring problem: it fails to make these girls seem real. They’re excellent singers, yes, but there’s no introspection, no personality, that shines through Access All Areas.

If progress is their aim, then this is fine proof of how a softly-softly approach is often best.

There are 11 songs on When You See Yourself, filled with pretty words and lovely tunes, but I would struggle to tell you what any of them are about. Although blessed with a raw, raspy tone that could make a shopping list sound sexy, Followill’s vocals are buried in a bass-heavy mix.

Her worthier sentiments are balanced by maturing wit, self-awareness and the distinctive snap'n'slap of her funky guitar grooves.

The songs themselves may not be complex but the simple and sincere emotions expressed on anthems such as the chiming indie epic Forever, the rip-roaring AC/DC-style rocker Running Round My Brain and the Rod-Stewart-flavoured piano ballad Every Dog Has Its Day carry a potent weight of feeling and offer euphoric release.

It may be billed as a tribute to a lost star, but this Winter wonderland serves as a reminder that the blues is still very much alive and kicking.

There is nothing particularly original or surprising here, yet in a pop market that is all interesting edges, self-enclosed scenes and leftfield genres, Ryder offers a hearty return to the reassuringly obvious, pitched straight into the mainstream. A star is born.

The songs are catchy, the emotions are sincere, and it is all driven by an intense desire to connect. But somehow Yungblud always sounds as if he’s trying too hard.

It sounds utterly gorgeous, and perhaps this laid-back, stripped-down folksy bent is part of a generational pop shift, echoing the intimate minimalism of Billie Eilish – but I have my doubts. ... Lorde’s lyrics are still acute, her singing superb, her songs beguiling, but her perspective has shifted from every-girl outsider to over-privileged solipsist. Solar Power is underpowered and unlikely to set the world on fire.

This is an album of mature, accessible pop-rock. The singing is beautiful, the playing immaculate, the sound warm and rounded, with nothing to scare the horses.

Opener Ready to Go Home is toweringly gorgeous, the Fela Kuti-like frenzy of Circle of Life is thrilling and the one chord riffing Love Ain’t Enough is a blast. Ballads offer more of a challenge, where Gillespie’s wheezy vocals have nowhere to hide.

It is a little daunting at first approach, but stylistic breadth and dynamic shifts make up for the stark brutality of their sound.

Styles’s curveball is more eccentric but more appealing, with an endearing quality of relish in its musical adventures. It is so old-fashioned it may actually come across as something new to its target audience.

Given that it's for dancing, Butler's production tends toward the cool--even plodding--but his polishing up of 20-year-old stylistic tics still entertains.

It hasn’t exactly all been easy listening, but still definitely Lydon’s most approachable album ever. It sounds as though it was hard-earnt light relief for him, fun for its chief protagonist to make, and with repeat plays it only proves increasingly infectious.

The first half's vocal tracks woefully resemble standard-issue chart fodder. There's some better instrumental stuff later on, but, overall, it's ordinary.

The harmonising on Call to War is excellent and I particularly like the short and sweet To the Woods. An enjoyable album.

Despite what the polished sonics might suggest, Twelve Carat Toothache is an ambitious record with real range, proving that Post has found his groove as America’s kaleidoscopic king of new-era pop.

The lyrics cleverly incorporate words and ideas from each programme. But a soundtrack featuring all the oddball artists from the series would have been more interesting.

The result is as swaggeringly confident, brash and modern as any mainstream hip hop being produced anywhere in the world right now.

Even if Years & Years aren’t taking any risks with the sound of the moment, they use it to good effect.

If you're already a Biffy Clyro fan, Opposites might be your idea of a masterpiece. If you're new to Biffy, it'll just give you a headache.

While You & I doesn’t break any new ground, it’s a spirited and smartly produced – if brief – album.

The country singer turns 80 at the end of the month and although much of the album saunters along, Nelson can still fill a song with emotion, as he shows on his own composition The Better Part of Me.

Archive seem strangely restricted, dulling their more inventive edges with a black-and-white quality of mood, texture, rhythm and melody, that leaves you craving emotional colour.

The Bridge is out of time yet timeless, pure pop class.

Her fifth record is dark, even by her standards, full of bitterness and pessimism.