Infinite Love itself feels like the sonic equivalent of the iTunes Visualizer: pulsing forms, growing in complexity, before turning in on themselves and shooting off in another direction. [Nov 2010, p.62]

Benin stalwarts including Black Santiago, The Picoby Band and El Rego Et Ses Commandos all deliver, while Poly-Rythmo De Cotonou get an outing on the atmospheric, if understated “Idavi” and the boogie funk of “Moulon Devla”. Les Sympathetics De Porto Novo’s set opener “A Min We Vo Nou We” is all ragged fuzz guitar and lifted JB licks, lit from within by the incendiary urgency of the Benin sound. [Jun 2018, p.69]

A record that urges you to lean closer to the speakers in order to fully hear everything that is being played and sung. [#216, p.63]

Funeral For Justice comes a step closer to channelling an authentic Mdou Moctar live experience. The title track wastes no time to demonstrate the unfettered power on tap, bursting from silence into a series of electrifying riffs and fervent claps, never letting up. [Jun 2024, p.53]

While PTSD is sometimes a slog, it's always substantial. [Jun 2014, p.63]

It's a well-worn concept, but one which Gorgun works through with curiosity and clarity of purpose. [Oct 2018, p.61]

From the trancelike undercurrent moving through “Bird On A Wire” and “Ghosts Of People” to the solid punk attack of “2020 Vision” and “Tout Est Meilleur”, the album is testament to Bush Tetras’ resilience. [Sep 2023, p.64]

The P-funk derived style of Dam-Funk us about as perfect a fit for Snoop's supine cool as can be imagined. [Feb 2014, p.57]

I Was Real isn’t going to disappoint 75 Dollar Bill’s old fans. ... Augmentations and roots moves do nothing to dilute 75 Dollar Bill’s essence. If anything, I Was Real is ultra-real. [Jul 2019, p.44]

The album deftly balances expansive environments with a singular vocal intimacy. [Nov 2018, p.51]

Earl Sweatshirt and billy woods, who kick off the proceedings with the intoxicatingly smooth “RIP Tracy”. MIKE and Sideshow offer up my personal favourite with “Bless”, and Boldy James teams up with TF on the moody “Trouble Man”. [Sep 2023, p.67]

It’s not uncommon for DIY punk, hardcore and noise artists to veer towards the more contemplative, electronic ends of musical experimentation. ... Croatian Amor’s exercise in post-apocalyptic world building is another effective example of this transition. [Feb 2019, p.53]

The band’s template has barely changed over those years but that isn’t to suggest a lack of artistic growth. “How Deep It Goes”, the opening track from their tenth album Let It All In, is a prime example of their peculiar progression as it exudes the reassuring warmth of California songsmiths of yesteryear yet still somehow manages to wedge a wash of icy interplay between Huemann’s guitar and Matthew Pierce’s synths smack dab in the middle of the track. [May 2020, p.48]

More than the spiritual feel of Impulse! releases by Sanders or Coltrane, this music recalls the groove oriented work of Turrentine, Idris Muhammad and Grover Washington Jr for CTI and Kudu. It’s warm weather music, made to be played through speakers propped in open windows, facing the street. [Jul 2018, p.58]

Finlay Clark and David Kennedy ride a similar wave to improv duos like 75 Dollar Bill or Orcutt/Corsano, recalling their own thrilling work on 2020’s Fast Edit. The sliced mayhem of that set is missing here: instead, the group seem to have spent the years working on stitching themselves ever more tightly together. [Jun 2024, p.58]

It's elegant and pristine, a febrile flutter of rhythms, glinting sequences and pale, shimmering backdrops. [Jul 2014, p.51]

This recording attests to their powerful rock credentials. [#201, p.63]

The various elements at work on these five finely etched pieces rarely settle into any single pattern or vibe, but they also never feel like pastiche. It’s all music for the trumpeter – whose playing has never sounded more mature and exploratory – and every component of the music is as rigorous and evolved as his own vision. [Mar 2025, p.44]

Playing it, you're reminded anew of the restlessness and emotional range at the heart of Young's art. [Feb 2014, p.64]

This Soul Jazz set is the biggest jungle splash for a long time, featuring the booming basslines, the fiercest of Amen breaks and heavyweight ragga vocals on essential cuts from Krome & Time, Cutty Ranks, M-Beat, Bizzy B, Lemon D, Top Cat, and more all dating from the prime years of 1993-95. [Jan/Feb 2026, p.97]

Those arrangements, many drawn from Ra’s own vintage charts but others assembled by Allen, have an urbane lushness, the 24-piece ensemble swinging hard in tight formation, only occasionally letting their freak flags fly. [Mar 2025, p.44]

Cross’s ability to get the job done with his stripped down trio is the real achievement here. [Mar 2019, p.65]

A slippery, shape-shifting quality is one of the great strengths of Amon Tobin's sixth album. Plainly put, Out From Out Where is impossible to pin down. [#226, p.67]

A few guest vocalists pop up in vivid cameos. .... But the guests are mere added attractions. Some of the most compelling tracks, like "No Death No Danger", "Mala Sangre" and the closing "Covenstead Blues", are all her. .... She creates her own world of sound, and her own context, and we must enter cautiously, never sure what we'll find but ready for anything. [Sep 2025, p.50]

May be the year's most surprising pure pop pleasure--precisely because it's nothing like you'd expect a pop album to be. [#224, p.61]

Indebted to various traditions of US rock, from resonant folk and blues to elegant indie pop, its understated songs are looser and more varied here than in her music with bands like Helium and Ex Hex, as if serving a different, affirming purpose. [Jun 2024, p.61]

Where NO was extreme in its attack, W opts to let the group dream, as a more acoustic angle is explored – with Wata’s ephemeral vocal being an ever present guiding spirit force that trails like incense smoke through the songs. Things eventually kick off, however, with “The Fallen”, a time-tested metal guitar dirge with an electronic sting in its tail that effortlessly reverts back to Boris at their amplifier worshipping best. [Feb 2022, p.58]

Every song on Fungus II aspires to soundtrack a twisted comic book or Hanna-Barbera cartoon about itself. Segall’s guitar and bass playing is wailing and distended while Chippendale lays down tight bursts of percussive fire. For the beetle-browed half hour this album lasts, these guys are here to party. [Apr 2020, p.63]