A polished affair which approaches doom metal with something like a pop sensibility – the melodies bring to mind Deftones or the accessible end of UK bands like Paradise Lost and My Dying Bride, though Esfandiari’s strain of gothic gloom, for all its theatricality, feels less superficial and more the product of genuine internal turmoil. [Nov 2021, p.62]

Where Vernon’s album [For Emma, Forever Ago] registers like a melancholic exorcism of listless youth and failed relationships, Bachman does not engage in that kind of soul searching, though he elicits a similarly potent emotional response. [Jan/Feb 2024, p.77]

It not so much that her talent has blossomed, more that it has thawed a little, releasing music that edges tantalizingly close to greatness. [Feb 2014, p.50]

From the cartoonishly unhinged prog/ boom-bap hybrid “Savage Nomad” to “Shine” (a duet with Blood Orange that flirts with melancholic, synth-heavy new romanticism) it’s the seemingly contradictory emotional timbres that animate uknowhatimsayin¿ and provide the core tension that brings the project to life. [Nov 2019, p.50]

The throttled mayhem that spits from the record is in keeping with the legacy of the aforementioned punks [Dead Kennedys and Misfits], as well as DC hardcore pioneers Bad Brains. [Oct 2025, p.54]

Some will find Cruel Country monotonous; the patient however will be rewarded with an abundance of thoughtful, delicate, often brutally plaintive songcraft. [Aug 2022, p.60]

Swans are alive, utterly. A terrible beauty is reborn. [Sep 2010, p.51]

Drawing on such lofty motifs doesn’t make Dalt’s records any less intimate or enjoyable. Instead, they offer more space for exploring the most vulnerable corners of an artist’s emotional state, by using metaphor and allusion as a way to express the inexpressible. [Jun 2018, p.52]

The production, courtesy of DJ Dahi, No ID and James Blake, spirals outward from the world this Long Beach native’s peers inhabit and into satisfyingly experimental territory. [Oct 2016, p.65]

This strained affair makes the party rocking simplicity of 2 Chainz or even LMFAO look absolutely artful. Brown's too smart to make music this dumb effectively. [Nov 2013, p.66]

Its satisfying blend of genres amplifies the best of what both these artists have to offer. [Apr 2026, p.63]

Don’t let inevitable mainstream acclaim obscure the beauty and ingenuity of this album; it’s big enough for everyone. [Apr 2019, p.52]

Both tends such fertile, fetid soil that it almost works as an argument against its creator bothering to break bread with anyone else. That is, until you remember that there’s no good reason that he or we should have to choose one course or the other. [May 2020, p.61]

A striking document of Swans' current live form. [Jul 2012, p.64]

His most intimate work to date. [Jan 2015, p.68]

Sorrow is a faithful revision. [Apr 2016, p.58]

[Tempest has] a sense of dues paid as a continual creative replenishment, rather than a swansong. [Nov 2012, p.63]

Ab-Soul music fuses street-level concerns with the sort of erudite, rhyme scheme-fixated wordplay more commonly associated with rapper who value beats and rhymes over life. [Jul 2012, p.71]

This collection, and its atmosphere of sharing a bench with the 20th century’s Mozart as he explores still nascent songs, is an appropriately seductive tease to what will doubtless be a decades-long unearthing of the vault’s untold treasures. The songs themselves, as they’re presented here, really are secondary to this feeling, something like finding a just unearthed message from a departed loved one. [Dec 2018, p.69]

Horse Lords music has never been untidy, but this LP’s seven tracks evince a hyper-focused precision. Even when they flirt with entropy during the last two minutes of “May Brigade”, the transition from rhythmic grid to textural layering is immaculately executed. ... This may not lead the people to call for Comradely Objects rather than Ed Sheeran or (name your preferred chart topper here) but it’ll do the job just fine the next time you need some new minimalist jams for a highway drive. [Nov 2022, p.62]

Until the Quiet Comes is cluttered and schmaltzy. [Nov 2012, p.59]

Stripped of the visuals, the seemingly endless succession of minor variations (75 tracks between the two collections) on the same sets of glossy and pleasant synth arpeggios can be at once bitty and overwhelming. [Oct 2016, p.63]

The percussive result is a monster truck rally of low end synths stomping the shit out of some scuzzy Gun Club/X/Flesh Eaters-style Los Angeles punk trash, while a cheering section of saxophones blast and honk away on the sidelines. [Sep 2024, p.58]

Once this inward looking tendency was a strength; now it seems safe. [Nov 2016, p.68]

The quartet’s albums represent a live sound that applies the means of a beat combo to frankly ecstatic ends via tuning while their mixtapes offer a more diverse and fragmentary accounting of collective interests. The twain finally meet on The Common Task. [Apr 2020, p.56]

The recording and mixing is impeccable, with each instrument distinctly isolated, enabling the tracks to take on lively 3D forms. This does result in a striking directness, but the tightly wrapped sound sometimes feels like it’s in battle with the naturally inventive playing of the trio. [Sep 2021, p.56]

Still Brazy is thoroughly and unapologetically regional, but its thematic engines are universal. [Aug 2016, p.63]

Marshall’s electronic, krautrock-ish backing tracks extended what Lanegan had previously laid down on previous albums Blues Funeral and Phantom Radio. Gargoyle however has more of an early 1980s UK electronic rock feel, with Lanegan’s rough vocal rasp sawing through musical timbres reminiscent of what was being played out at Manchester’s Factory. [May 2017, p.47]