There’s a lot to wrap your ears and brain around, and it can make a strange load of sense if you allow yourself to be carried away by its relentless stream. [Nov 2021, p.52]

His sermons are always memorably provocative, but in playing to the crowd sometimes subtleties get lost. [Dec 2014, p.60]

Those accustomed to the aggro, politically charged jazz rock of Brooklyn's Sunwatchers might be taken aback by this second solo outing from their saxophonist. Tobias titles what he concocts here "anti-imperialist pop", which shows there is still a kind-hearted intent behind the music even if its bubbly beats and dreamy vocals might sound like a mad stab at the mainstream. [Oct 2025, p.62]

A beautifully realised collection, Around is remarkably ego-free -- perhaps too much so. [#266, p.67]

Koch feels like a merger of the two [Diversions 1994-1996 and Dutch Tvashar Plumes], backsliding into the dance timbres of yesteryear, and their hissy, ever moody dissolutions become predictable. [Oct 2014, p.63]

There's nothing fake about the record itself, however, and any interpretations of irony will be largely rooted in the audience's prejudices about who and what certain styles of music are for. [Apr 2016, p.46]

Oh Me Oh My is at its strongest when exhibiting an everyman quality comparable to that of his street level sculptures. [Mar 2023, p.52]

Each song on Universe Room offers up a unique aural sensation that becomes more acute with repeated hearings. While some of the material takes several playbacks to fully tune into, other songs such as the opening “Driving Time” (with its crackling night-time cricket chorus intro), the mysterious “I Will Be A Monk”, the Pixies sounding “Elfin Flower With Knees” and hit single (surely!) “Fly Religion” become instant ear worms burrowing their way into your brain. [Mar 2025, p.59]

Not a satisfying record, nor a fully rounded one, but one that suggests so much future exploration. [Oct 2018, p.56]

The gauzy textures that she creates on New Decade do capture something of crystalline stasis. It’s only the rhythmical structure of the “Snow And Pollen” – two electronic pulses that sound, one, two, one, two – that connotes a diffuse sense of menace. [Nov 2021, p.57]

So it's Ra the entertainer we get here.... On the second disc the first three tracks take matters further out. [Oct 2014, p.70]

Crazy, tender and occasionally corny, Rundgren remains defiantly unpredictable. [Jul 2017, p.60]

The first half is far more intriguing. [May 2012, p.72]

A few tracks don’t work, like “Murdergram Deux” where he fast raps alongside Eminem in a staccato bore. While LL can still flow, he doesn’t find pockets of rhythm with the same ease he once did. But there is magic. [Nov 2024, p.56]

Promises doesn’t always come across like a true meeting of equals. Laswell used the saxophonist as a plug-in element in the late 90s, Michael Mantler’s Jazz Composer’s Orchestra did the same on 1968’s Communications, and there’s a bit of that feel here. A player with as unique and instantly recognisable a voice as Sanders always risks becoming a gimmick, but his performance here is stunningly beautiful, and the album would be unimaginable without him. [Apr 2021, p.57]

The energy is impressive and it's hard to find technical fault but the stagnation is undeniable. [May 2012, p.73]

For most of the album, the core group explore Lewis’s own compositions, with the leader and Hoffman engaging in thoughtful conversation as Jaffe conveys pulse rather than time. [Apr 2023, p.56]

Choirboys sing the poems of Nils Christian Moe-Repstad over Eivind Aarset’s guitar, but as with the more expansive orchestral passages, it can come across as earnestly ecclesiastical. The most affecting pieces are those where Henriksen and Bang strip it down, such as on “The Swans Bend Their Necks Backward To See God”, where pitched down trumpet lows like foghorns over the Humber valley. [Nov 2018, p.68]

Darkthrone do pretty much what they please, divorced from scene politics and free to enthuse about Ron Hardy mixes or delivering the post. [Nov 2016, p.56]

What we get is Youngs in troubadour mode, singing over sine waves or accompanying himself on acoustic guitar, [Oct 2013, p.54]

Slightly rawer and more aggressive than the duo’s last couple, Fearn’s productions cleave towards the minimal and raw, stripped right back to choppy beats and lurking bass. ... Success has not diminished Williamson’s need to grind an axe, which may not be pretty or noble, but is at least honest and undeniably consistent with what came before. [Apr 2023, p.60]

There's less sense of puzzle and struggle than we're used to with Aphex Twin... but Chosen Lords is certainly meticulous and absorbing. [#266, p.51]

Her own voice breaks sometimes, and it’s in these moments – when she seems to drop the mask – that the album lands its most impactful blows. Tracks like “Cosmic Joke” and “Anthem Of Me” bring more dense, pressurised operatics. [May 2025, p.51]

There's something enchantingly nostalgic about Awe Natural. [May 2012, p.74]

Miniawy's trumpet makes an appearance over the moody reversed bass and Auto-Tune of "Reels In 360", while opener "I See The Stadium" pairs his agitated uvular Arabic with Aussel's hulking bass propulsions and the guttural snarls of Lord Spikeheart. [Apr 2026, p.62]

Sometimes Liars sounds like a group whose previous sonic journeying has inspired a fresh look at the familiar. All too often, however, it's as though, having stepped outside the confines of conventional song, they can never believe in it enough to return. [Sep 2007, p.56]

Loose Talk is an engaging listen. [May 2025, p.52]

A natural follow-up to his first solo outing. [#229, p.68]