Colonial patterns makes your ears feel like magnetised tape heads, the music dulled, pockmarked, riven with fissures of noise and age. [Oct 2013, p.58]

Robert Hood's first album as Floorplan is if anything more functional than Marcel Dettmann's offering. [Oct 2013, p.58]

Something about the music's rhythmic flexibility, the paradoxical slippage between half-speed, double-speed and triplet grooves, allows almost anything to be folded in to its matrix without altering its essential character. [Oct 2013, p.57]

In truth, every twist and turn, every tempo change on Siberia is evidence of the group's unabated thirst for adventure. [Oct 2013, p.55]

Though heavier than ever, Jesu shares a bittersweet longing with the best of Mould's oeuvre, a sense of innocence on the cusp of corruption. [Oct 2013, p.55]

The payoff comes about a third of the way in, when the spirit of Foghat makes an unexpected appearance and everything goes boogie. [Oct 2013, p.55]

Guitarists John and Michael Gibbons tar into riffs which, for all their power, articulate a cosmic loneliness, while Isobel Sollenberger intones troubled mantras with the benighted insistence of an unquiet spirit. [Oct 2013, p.55]

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

Hardly the stuff of revolution, Still Smiling nevertheless feels comfortable in all of its swollen riches. [Oct 2013, p.54]

This is a spellbinding album by a singular guitarist who combines the dexterity of Paco De Lucia with the hypnotic death-drawl of Bukka White. [Oct 2013, p.51]

The album repeats and reiterates her major concerns--artistic, political--and renders them witty and endearing. [Oct 2013, p.51]

Climactic yet precisely controlled, it's a reminder of The Necks strengths, all of which are on display at different points throughout Open: their astute handling of pacing and momentum, finely honed collective sense of timing, and their shared ability to balance at length a group equilibrium, be it delicate or clamorous in register. [Oct 2013, p.50]

It's simply clean, so the outstanding performances come over strongly. [Oct 2013, p.49]

The R&B tropes are part of a reassuring past, and the half-there vocals don't add enigma so much as leave the music unchallenged and stick in its old ways. [Oct 2013, p.47]

This is dance music, but not as we know it, and a delight to experience. [Oct 2013, p.47]

[The] precisely arranged layers of keyboards and guitars have as many behind-the-door delights as an advent calendar. [Oct 2013, p.46]

It's Ferraro's best since Far Side Virtual. [Oct 2013, p.46]

Another nuance of Virgins is the pacing. With the exception of a few slightly predictable orchestral driftscapes, Hecker's editing instincts have rarely sounded this restless and razor-sharp. [Oct 2013, p.45]

His concerns are serious--consumerism, race, fame, relationships--but he rarely addresses them with the craft or focus they deserve. [Sep 2013, p.66]

Run The Jewels is a document of true friends finding the fun in being very angry. [Sep 2013, p.66]

In small doses this perpetual explosion is often magnificent. [Sep 2013, p.66]

Kaani is a tireless surging wave of uplifting music. [Sep 2013, p.65]

Listening in one session is like wolfing a hurried seven-course meal with post-dinner coffee and is roughly as messy. [Sep 2013, p.65]

To counter the straightforward songs there's a raucous stoop-start freakout on the likes of "Beat" and "Separate." [Sep 2013, p.63]

As well as these old school paeans to rock's cosmic moments, there are tracks fascinating through a percussive complexity that nods to minimalism. [Sep 2013, p.63]

Tracks like "Steel Drummer" shade between euphoric rave and freakout energy, while "Black And Blue" has a distinct rock edge with its dark riffs and darker mood. [Sep 2013, p.63]

This is a visionary coming into his own. [Sep 2013, p.56]

Now far from young, and sounding a little tired, his voice is still tender with yearning, and devotees will welcome a further installment in his emotionally ramshackle story. [Sep 2013, p.52]