But perhaps the most effective retread is Talking Heads' "Listening Wind": Gabriel removes the funk, parks the dance, and leaves the words to do the work.

Restlessly inventive, Hot Chip also manage what many bedroom eclectics don't: crafting a genuinely organic, proper album, and the relaxed enthusiasm that drives this debut is absurdly infectious. [Jun 2004, p.94]

It's hard to imagine a less workable hybrid than antifolk and disco pop--respect to Deez, then, for not simply avoiding disaster but also making music of a dangerously infectious nature. [May 201, p.86]

It's Krall's voice that has always been her biggest problem... consequently, these songs feel like elegant but bloodless conceits. [Jun 2004, p.85]

Repeated listens--it's a grower--reveal a number of meatier, surprisingly hard-rocking songs. [May 2007, p.99]

Brothers Jake and Jamin Orrall plough a familiar semi-feral blues-punk furrow for the most part, with varying degrees of success, but are best when they depart from the template. [Dec 2012, p.72]

[A] largely tentative set. [Dec 2016, p.38]

In the absence of original recordings, it's hard to know what to judge these against. [Oct 2014, p.80]

What elevates Under The Covers above mimicry is the poignancy of the performances from all concerned. [May 2006, p.124]

This 12-song return tones down the pomp, in favour for a return to the band's breathless takes on Ramones/Buzzcocks pop-punk formula. [Nov 2012, p.75]

[The Hexadic System] sounds complicated, but primarily this is a guitar record. [Mar 2015, p.81]

All 10 tracks on his solo debut album are effectively reiterations of the same song, but it's a terrific one. [May 2016, p.79]

Much of the rest, alas, suggests a gift not for clairvoyance but invisibility. [May 2011, p.94]

So much of Eyes Open is nearly, but not quite. [Jun 2006, p.114]

There are flashes of thrilling chaos but all too often they are contained and subdued by fussy programming.

The result is a warm, reto-feeling rendering of his brand of mechanical funk and psychedelic hip hop. We've been here before, but it's still a lovely listen. [May 2009, p.95]

With every album that he writes HIM mainman Ville Valo gets closer to his dream fusion of Metallica, Depeche Mode and Ozzy, while still remembering to add some distinctly gothic beauty. [Oct 2007, p.93]

It's sad to hear all their youthful fizz go flat so soon. [Sep 2018, p.28]

Ambient ebb and flow aside, vocals and synth/guitar motifs show Outside as a pp record, while a darkly urgent cover of Bonnie "Prince" Billy's "Strange Form Of Life" provides unexpected topspin. [Nov 2013, p.67]

Trick is the Bloc Party singer's comedown record: confessional, emotional and, in places, a bit much. [Nov 2014, p.76]

Amid all the dirty, clanging glam, there are unfinished moments. [Apr 2007, p.119]

The lungs are in good shape here. [Sep 2009, p.86]

It's frequently impressive and occasionally lovely, but often loses its soul in Emmanuel's relentless barrage of spectacular effects. [Mar 2012, p.107]

Mitch Ryder here astutely merges heartbreaking social realism with accomplished, funky Motown/James Brown grooves. [Mar 2012, p.97]

The tautly controlled power of the performances meshes with the barely harness emotion of Ban Gibbard's impeccably sculpted, tortured lyrics. [Apr 2015, p.73]

[Moses Archuleta's] hazy, lo-fi house jams as Moon Diagrams shoot for dreamy but are mostly just soporific. When he occasionally stirs from his torpor to write a actual song, the results are much more fulfilling. [Aug 2017, p.32]

There is a candid, personal quality to "Discreet" and "Have Fun Tonight," a sincere hymn to queer polyamory. Meanwhile, Chairlift's Caroline Polachek joins for the elegantly torrid "Togetherness." [Apr 2018, p.26]

All elements are delivered with an easy, effortless roll--you suspect The Donkeys may turn out to be lions. [Oct 2008, p.83]

The likes of "Minimum Wage" and "Too Much Not Enough" sound like a youth-club band who've simultaneously overdosed on Haribo and the Gang Of Four, which is both preposterous and admirable behavior from people in their thirties. [Jun 2014, p.71]

Apply megawatt tunes and career-best performances and you’ve got an album to top even 2002’s criminally neglected "Life On Other Planets."

Fine writing, then, and there’s musical variety, too.

{A] far superior effort [than Rebirth]. [Feb 2011, p.84]

Kath pillages heartily from Belgian new beat, braindance, electroclash and EDM cheese to forge brutally effective industrial lullabies. [Oct 2016, p.26]

If you worship Wavves, or the epic SoCal proto-hardcore of the first Redd Kross and Adolescents record, kneel and marvel. [May 2012, p.67]

As usual where Cheap Trick are concerned, the fast ones are much better than the slow ones. [May 2021, p.24]

Hot Cakes adds little to their hybrid Queen, AC/DC, Van Halen and Gun N' Roses, but their air-punching thrills of "Forbidden Love" and "Concrete" are undeniable. [Sep 2012, p.74]

Humour takes too firm a hold as the band play on, creating the probably unfair feeling that this is just a light tribute to old, inspired sounds. [May 2002, p.108]

It helps that these 10 primitive songs are excellent, and that The Datsuns attack them with such vehemently anti-ironic gusto. [Nov 2002, p.118]

Paradoxically, its spare, solo-voice-and-guitar format... comes closer to matching DiFranco's charismatic live performances than prior band-driven efforts. [Mar 2004, p.87]

She's all suffocating style, no sweat. [Nov 2004, p.99]

These 19 tracks feel designed to float in a space between clear genre boundaries, somewhere purposefully undefined. [Nov 2011, p.106]

A discreet, quietly rapturous record. [Nov 2012, p.72]

His fourth solo album is structurally ambitious, obtuse and occasionally brilliant. [Nov 2012, p.83]

It can sometimes feel like a band trying on a variety of hats, although the songs themselves generally ring true, anthemic and delivered with a fistful of grit. [Apr 2020, p.30]

Never quite rises above the mundane. [Aug 2005, p.98]

Feeling more airbrushed than lo-fi. [Jul 2011, p.79]

Without notable emotional heft, however, the identikit cool and sub-Lana Del Rey poses prove wearisome, the cloying artifice insubstantial. [May 2017, p.39]

Lott croons plaintive lyrics over weaponised sci-fi soundscapes fizzing with post-dubstep beats, bleeps and electro-classical string flourishes. [Aug 2015, p.80]

Articulate, emotional and primed for the dancefloor. [Jan 2014, p.71]

While he doesn't quite kick like he used to, Weaver's lugubrious voice and ear for the creepiness inherent in old-time folk make for an engrossing listen. [Sep 2008, p.98]

On Subculture, The Selecter's dismay at the world is as powerful as ever. [Jul 2015, p.81]

No Scare careens between sunbaked Americana, dreamy melodicism and more aggressive moves that are less reminiscent of Walker's exploratory folk-rock than the full throttle pummelling of Rosaly's sides with jazz titan Peter Brotzmann. [Sep 2016, p.75]

His choices suit not only his rich, resonant baritone but also rich Machin's soul-and-gospel-heavy treatments. [Jan 2022, p.24]

This is something wholly unexpected. [Sep 2015, p.78]

These sparse, string-based scores straddle the line between wannabe ethereal and grainily earthy. [Jul 2002, p.106]

A magnificently rich and confident debut.... This is how Fischerspooner should have sounded. [Dec 2002, p.142]

[The album recalls] the warm, breezy charms of labelmates Beach house. [Mar 2012, p.92]

These dead-earnest takes are suffused with existential melancholy, as the group's feathery vocals bring uplift to the heavy emotional burden of the songs. [Mar 2014, p.71]

Their defining touchstones remain intact. [Jan 2016, p.81]

Right On! casts its own seductively austere shadow. [Jan 2016, p.77]

What's more surprising is just how good it all is, the tunes great, the mood fun, the album infectious. [Mar 2009, p.92]

He's hit the sweet spot between fresh and the familiar. [Aug 2016, p.83]

At times the elemental pounding can become an aural bludgeoning. [Oct 2014, p.80]

Despite being her most superficially conventional work to date it may be her most slow-burning, with less of the bricolage charm that distinguished the earlier work. [May 2009, p.89]

He is a talent with real musical depth. [Jul 2013, p.78]

All in all, A Thousand Miles is a diverting curio, but no substitute for the original. [Apr 2015, p.78]

Once a songwriter with a deft facility for catchy hooks, his melodies droop under the lethargic tempos, turning his self-deprecation into something like self-absorption. [Jan 2019, p.22]

Another generous serving of sparklingly cinematic guitar rock, largely inspired by (and dedicated to) band confidant, producer and musician Richard Swift, who died in 2018. But this is no sombre remembrance, rather a full-throttle celebration of the unifying power of music. [Oct 2020, p.29]

Too often, however, he's overshadowed by the phlegmatic vocals of pub rocker Roger C Reale, which means the most revelatory tracks here are the instrumentals. [May 2021, p.24]

Go Go... is never less than delightful--at its best like Belle & Sebastian having a stab at Portishead. [Oct 2007, p.99]

Some tracks suffer, not from a lack of inherent quality but from the fact that you've already heard any number of perfectly decent, faithful reading of them. [Feb 2012, p.88]

Modish but strangely clinical. [Aug 2004, p.94]

Wooden Shjips continue their work in simple but effective grooves, around which the band discursively noodle. [Jun 2009, p.113]

Where Flying Lotus scatterbrain brings emotive grooves out of madness, GLK can only manage ugly, mostly boring sketches. [Nov 2012, p.75]

Tusk this isn't, but Tusk it doesn't need to be. In an age of off-the-shelf LInda Perry pop, the Mac keep the mainstream interesting. [May 2003, p.98]

A lush but unthrilling album. [Nov 2003, p.122]

It is readymade for a kegger; the problem is, on this, their third LP, they have yet to shape their influences into a sound they can call their own. [Oct 2012, p.77]

After "Waiting," a disarmingly soulful duet with Noah Cyrus, the LP gets darker and more resonant. [Oct 2017, p.24]

Two Vines mostly sticks with the tried-and-true. [Dec 2016, p.26]

Lifeblood seems closest in tone to Everything Must Go, although the sound is lighter, less bombastic, more soothing. [Dec 2004, p.148]

Too often his cluttered samples and constant fidgeting shatter [the] fragile spells. [Apr 2005, p.98]

More often than not, Ben appears to be channeling his hero JJ Cale, although the spirited title track doffs a beret in the direction of Richard Thompson. [Mar 2011, p.97]

Scattergood's voice may be an acquired taste, but she works it skillfully. [Jul 2013, p.80]

Drawing on a palette of classic Beatles/Queen influences via plenty of heavy metal sturm und drang. [Jan 2020, p.25]

A more stripped=down approach. [May 2021, p.28]

The music glistens and gleams. ... An intoxicating ride. [Sep 2017, p.34]

A dreary debut. [Feb 2006, p.74]

Stripped of the usual bells and whistles, and backed by unplugged instruments, it's left to his voice to do the work and, given the length of the thing, it soon starts to grate. [Dec 2012, p.79]

Ready To Die was never going to match Raw Power. When you’re 65, rekindling youth’s righteous fury can sound like grouchiness or--worse--play-acting. But there are worthwhile moments, mostly when Williamson leaves space for Pop to express his vulnerability.

While his unique but resolutely unchanging styles of slap bass shards and cut-up vocal syllables works well in a balanced DJ set, it wears quickly over 22 tracks. [Jul 2011, p.94]

Good enough that you barely notice Macca, Prince and the other obligatory guests. [Dec 2005, p.100]

Their thing is Troubadour-era rootsy rocking rather than harmonic rapture, but American Goldwing's free-wheeling charms are still hard to resist. [Oct 2011, p.81]

Not even tight productions from Eminem and Dre can stop things from flagging midway. [May 2005, p.95]

Everything Goes Wrong is almost sickeningly good: songs are tight, short and fun, none outstay their welcome, all leave something behind in your brain as they rush to completion on a wave of multi-layered vocals, euphoric guitars and wall-of-chrome production. [Oct 2009, p.119]

Occup[ies] the same sonic territory as The Dandy Warhols' underrated Come Down. [Aug 2003, p.108]

Here, they tinker with the formula slightly, shedding the surf drums, and adding washes of synth (usually a mistake, and so it proves). [Jun 2011, p.94]

Surely--surely!--this is an elaborate hoax. [Oct 2006, p.110]

Four albums in, and Cold War Kids still feel like a band trying to decide what they are. [May 2013, p.69]