Set against jarring synths, the macho, sexualised lyrics sound seedy--or worse, menacing--and what prosaic hooks exist are obscured by the dirge.

Nick Lowe is pop's master of pastiche, and this delightful collection of country bar-room and lounge ballads sounds like a game of spot the musical references.

Her approach is confident and challenging, but not arch – several direct, haunting love songs are as delicate and affecting as any Adele tear-jerker.

Sparer instrumentation and slack tempos mean that singer Luke Pritchard dominates, and his reedy voice fails to enliven trite lyrics about lust and fame.

The song kick-starts the album's powerful sense of forward motion, of a woman struggling to wrestle free from expectations, relationships and religious convention.

The air is predictably valedictory, freighted with reflections on love, faith and intimations of mortality. 'Don't go to any trouble/You know I won't be here long . . . ' he sings in Westerberg's Any Trouble - in a voice as strong and clear as a bell.

The sound of the album is deliberately vibrant and varied.

This fifth album trades their signature Fender Stratocaster rock sound for hard-plucked acoustic guitars and lutes, conveying a majestic sense of space, the feeling that the music will unfold at its own pace, however long it takes.

14 songs over an hour's running time is a lot of nonsense to digest. For the Chili Peppers, songwriting is a medium without a message, unless it's just to let your inhibitions go and dance.

As packed and punchy as Black Eyed Peas on steroids, this is the sound of the overground.

The melodies aren't as strong as those on Backwoods Barbie but Dolly Parton's wit, sincerity and plucky pragmatism allow her to get away with simplistic advice like: "Lead the good life, just treat this planet right and try to all be friends" and icky lines about painting pretty rainbows in the sky.

Backed by his father's old orchestra, Fela Kuti's son Seun shows how afrobeat should be played: its irrepressible funky surge offset by truly scorching brass fanfares.

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

Songs And Stories is plenty good enough to be going on with.

Highlights are all duets with strong women, notably Stevie Nicks.

A pleasant, enjoyable album from a multi-talented man.

Perhaps the most extraordinary achievement of this funny, hard-hitting, thrilling album is that it actually sounds like a coherent and purposeful piece of work, a statement of what hip hop can mean, and where it can go.

His sound has matured considerably: he's less intent on blowing your ears off with dancehall's battery, than offering his own, still highly piquant take on slow-grind R&B.

Hynes's voice is refined into an emotive croon. Inventive pop from a bright indie talent.

The songs are slickly constructed but you can't help feeling it is familiar territory and not a patch on past triumphs.

This feels more like a palette cleanser, a statement of intent that Stone has ditched the commercial gloss.

The result is furiously syncopated, no-holds-barred rock made marvellously strange by Camara's squawking fiddle and invocatory singing.

Despite the subject matter, this is an invigorating celebration of the joys of great songwriting and proof of the power of one man and his piano.

While Touré acquits himself imaginatively in a variety of settings, the whirring, jangling opener Sokosondou, with just his own musicians, feels the most compelling track.

They're still chronicling gangster life, albeit a former one, but the beats are now funkier, offering a surprisingly accessible counterpoint to the cinematic, bloodthirsty narratives of star rapper Ghostface Killah. His caustic delivery propels the best tracks here.

A legion of co-producers attempt to recreate the slick dance-pop for which she is famed, but too often her husky voice and arch delivery are given short shrift by bloated house beats and perfunctory hooks.

Though consistently ground-breaking and lyrically challenging, Ritual Union never feels like hard work.

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.

This highly enjoyable celebration of the Lord is co-produced by country star Jamey Johnson.

Halfway in, Vannucci finds his feet with the bluesy No Whiskey, before an impeccable run of spry, sun-kissed alt-country numbers announce him as Las Vegas's answer to Tom Petty.

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

Defiantly puerile, LMFAO stake out their world of champagne and "hotties" with shout-along slogans. Harmless hedonism.

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

The two make a fine vocal duo, but even more astonishing is their instrumental virtuosity.

None of it will set the Saturday dancefloors on fire with pouting thrills, though it may sound cool enough over coffee in the cafes of Sunday morning.

The resulting guitar pop sound is more professional and commercial than the Alabama duo's formerly more playful style, but thanks to a wealth of well-written songs, fans of old and new should be equally entertained.

It's more Glee Club than cutting edge pop queen, and, as is so often the case with big pop albums, too many production teams spoil the froth.

The duo's sinister raps are as shockingly impressive as they are morally disturbing.

The production doesn't always give Nicks's gothic imagery enough waft, but fans will love puzzling over which of her paramours she's recalling on Secret Love.

Put simply, the album blends gospel, blues and rock but with some exciting interpretations of interesting old records.

There cannot be another musical duet around at the moment who are able to make two acoustic guitars and two voices produce a sound that is so subtle and yet powerful.

This fabulous box-set finally unites the trilogy. Tragic, poignant, yet uplifting, Newbury's tough-guy singing will often inexorably reduce the listener to tears.

The affection is winning, as is Metheny's mastery of the guitar and harmonic subtlety, but the tone of ruminative gentleness does start to seem unvaried.

On his fifth album, he seizes the mainstream jugular with a lushly romantic, brightly orchestrated and delightfully optimistic collection of epic love songs.

This album is a musical gumbo: a rich, surprising and ultimately satisfying stew of Simon's folk, rock and pop influences from all over the world.

The confidence of this Texan trio's last effort (2009's Fits) is lacking on their first major-label release.

This isn't mere cleverness, it's instinctive musicality, buoyed up by three other fine players.

Sharper production focuses the singer's woozier tendencies, revealing a succession of hooks to adorn his take on Neil Young's grooving folk-rock and Blur's twisted indie.

After an opinion-dividing experimental phase with 2009's Humbug, roar back to melodic life on their fourth album.

Her uncompromising, June Taboresque alto and imaginative, original material--from ye olde narrative ballads to modern love songs--are enduringly seductive.

Gaga goes over the top and keeps on going: exhilarating, exhausting blockbuster entertainment.

Let's hope the slightly odd CD cover image does not put anyone off discovering the music held within because Jarosz has produced a fine album.

Parping away beneath her synthesised fantasies and hypnotic dance floor dramas, you can also hear the unlikely stirrings of an Eighties sax-solo revival.

Epic and intimate, serious and playful, Okkervil River's third album is genuinely awe inspiring, growing with each replaying.

The pair tracked down musicians who worked on Sixties spaghetti westerns, then added Jack White and Norah Jones as singers, resulting in a delicious album, redolent of easy listening but with all flabbiness removed and replaced by a modern warmth and elegance.

There is, as Bush intended, much more air around the songs, which can reduce their original, raw intensity but also gives them a more mature, lingering potency.

They have done Ray Charles proud.

It's something of a connoisseur's collection (steering clear of some of the big hits such as Release Me) but has treasures such as Making Believe.

Pitched somewhere between his two most famous albums, Play and 18, it's hardly groundbreaking but is enjoyable none the less.

A sensational debut from the British rapper. Tempah's wit, imagery and rhythmic flow is offset by schoolboy humour and a tendency to build raps from non sequiturs.

This is glorious summer music, possibly the summer of 1974, but sunshine all round none the less.

Full of groove and grit, it's raw and enjoyable.

The foray ultimately fails because Laurie's voice is no more than adequate.

Blending hi-tech and lo-fi, modern synthesised sound and old-fashioned song writing, her work plumbs torrid emotional depths, similar to alt-rock stars such as Lou Barlow.

Following 2009's hookup with Drive-By Truckers, Potato Hole, his latest record finds him backed by hip hop combo The Roots, who nudge the 66-year-old organist towards his funkiest excursion in years.

A flat-out belter of the Adele/Florence school, surrounded variously by daft orchestral sturm-und-drang and flimsy ProTools disco/house. Better may come.

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.

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

Even where the musical ideas are strong, they're sapped by the determinedly relaxed ambiance.

Pecknold enthusiastically revealed how the album was a direct result of his indulgence in MP3 piracy, as he tracked back to discover Fairport Convention, Roy Harper, Crosby, Stills & Nash, Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, Bob Dylan and all the heroes of the Sixties folk boom.

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.

Fairport Convention are like the Stanley Matthews of folk music--age does nothing to erode essential quality.

Earle is a busy man, writing novels, acting and recording but he has found time to make his 14th album full of wonderful moments.

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

Though her career has been occasional, momentum from a recent Spex reunion has resulted in this terrific solo record, which channels her kitschy style into a synthy pop sound.

Her soprano singing is a little derivative of Krauss's but is still sweet and clear and is surely a work in progress given her youthfulness.

Although something of a melting pot, this is an original and accessible album, blending world influences with old time American music.

The rapping hasn't been completely abandoned, but the emphasis here is on his sweet soul voice and a thumping Motown groove, an intriguing change of direction that's both passionate and populist.

His harmonies have a louche charm, his trumpet sound has a fascinating vocal intimacy, and he makes lightning-fast interplay with the quintet, especially sax player Walter Smith III.

Slipping easily between lush orchestral pop and electronic symphonics redolent of Air, she also keeps a firm hand on the lyrical tiller, occasionally even bearing comparison to the poetic pith of Leonard Cohen.

Together they make efficient, likeable, club-friendly pop, with the house numbers less memorable than her drum and bass leanings.

Inspired by his hometown of Torquay and musically taking a leaf from Steely Dan and Fleetwood Mac, swapping his computer for the studio seems to have paid off with these brilliant, sunset funk songs.

This latest effort is more muted, but no less complete, with fabulous images of rustic solitude and existential dread married to smouldering country-rock.

Alison Krauss and Union Station have a marvellous chemistry as a band - and it's as impressive as ever on Paper Airplane, their first album together since 2004.

The new songs shimmer with languid, sun-kissed grooves, anthemic choruses that U2 would kill for, along with a fine line in tender romance.

This debut switches effortlessly from r&b ballads to punchy rap tunes. With her big voice and ballsy attitude, is she Ilford's very own Pink?

I worry about where they can go next with such a restrictive musical template, but here they have managed subtle refinement without sacrificing the essence of their primitive appeal.

Using entirely analogue tape, Vig, together with top mixer Alan Moulder, brings a deliciously lump-free production consistency to the Foos, who have often erred between the indigestible extremes of thrash-metal and acoustic angst.

To have four songs over 10 minutes on your debut is brave; when the record recalls Neil Young's sadder moments and explores the anguish of a break-up, it is foolhardy.

Coated with a West Coast varnish and filled with radio-friendly melodies Hope St will provide great background music for warm evenings in the garden. With continued listening, however, it's liable to leave you cold.

The album is the second in the four-volume Nomad series and the Cowboy Junkies said they felt they owed Chesnutt something. They have paid their debt in handsome fashion.

British rock desperately needs a big new act to capture the popular imagination. Though hyped in the music press and rising extra-fast, this London-based quartet lack the vision to fit that particular bill.

Knocking around for twenty years and now down to a duo, Cornershop are still coming up with brilliantly playful pop.

Despite her weak voice and empty lyrics, the troubled Disney graduate has placed herself at the avant-garde of pop with this masterful mixture of über-cool dubstep and sugary pop.

She attacks old soul numbers with gusto, turning them into cheery Stones-ish romps, but is at her best on pared-back material heavy with world-weary pathos.

It could have been mawkish but it's a simple, affecting and lovely tribute.

It's all an interesting time capsule and what makes it worthwhile for Cash fans is that there are 26 previously unreleased tracks. Disc 2 sounds a tad more produced but a song about dismissing a former lover--Wide Open Road--and the jaunty Five Minutes To Live are treats.

Full of tunes and pizzazz, it's unexpectedly good fun.