Some of it sounds like coffee-shop background fodder. [Apr 2006, p.96]

A dozen remarkable tracks. [Feb 2006, p.78]

There's more here for Oldham fans than Tortoise fanciers. [Feb 2006, p.76]

As ever: endlessly clever, utterly inessential. [Feb 2006, p.81]

It's all far more familiar than might be expected. [Nov 2005, p.111]

The most intense record of Cash's career. [Feb 2006, p.68]

[The Gossip] have evolved a blend of rough and impassioned garage-soul that owes as much to Tina Turner, Peggy Lee and The Ronettes as it does to Sonic Youth and The White Stripes. [Mar 2006, p.96]

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

This mass-market music deserves more than a minority audience. [Feb 2006, p.75]

A turbid affiar. [Nov 2006, p.114]

The ambition's hampered by Julian Casablancas' sad-sack singing. [Feb 2006, p.68]

Nope, this is not easy listening, yet he's never made a more beautiful album. [Jan 2006, p.108]

Foxx... is trying too hard. [May 2006, p.114]

If the reheated Odelay-isms of last year's Guero felt like a tactical move in the wake of the soul-bearing torment of Sea Change, Guerolito has an equally hollow ring. [Feb 2006, p.86]

Korn are too lumpen to handle 'sophisticated.' [Jan 2006, p.102]

This is fizzy, superficial pop by a band convinced they're making classic rock. [Dec 2005, p.114]

At first it's too Linda Perry; soft-rock with feminist principles. [Mar 2006, p.96]

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]

In many ways [it] seems in thrall to its predecessor. As a study in System Of A Down's multifarious strengths and occasional weaknesses, however, it's indispensable. [Jan 2006, p.110]

As an oasis of calm in a world of noise and chaos, it's easy to understand her appeal. [Jan 2006, p.114]

The trio only really let loose on their sprawling, wailing cover of Jonathan Richman's "Don't Let Your Youth Go To Waste." [Feb 2006, p.86]

It's a majestic transformation. [Dec 2005, p.102]

Such a heady, high-octane swirl that, perversely enough, you often forget you're listening to a Madonna record. [Dec 2005, p.102]

Although Father Divine ultimately feels more like a sketchbook than a coherent work, Ladd's doodles contain more fertile ideas than most artists' finished albums. [Mar 2006, p.91]

In this live setting, fascinatingly, the brutality to which the songs are subjected only serves to underscore their poignancy. [Dec 2005, p.100]

With Oberst's frail and quavering but steel-lined voice high in the mix, it clarifies how exceptional his lyrics are, and what exactly they're about. [Jan 2006, p.104]

Gira's Angels side... loses its way in bluster and dirge. The Akron tracks, however, are a revelation. [Dec 2005, p.109]

A madly ambitious, darkly despondent and goofily exuberant grand folly of a record. [Album of the Month, Dec 2005, p.98]

Even with Rubin dialling things back, the material grabs the listener by the collar and holds on tight. [Album of the Month, Feb 2006, p.66]

Your appreciation of Scab Dates will be predicated on a high tolerance to long bongo solos and songs called things like "Abrasions Mount The Timpani". [Jan 2006, p.113]

A fascinating document... Only select morsels, though... will make your GBV mix tape. [Jan 2006, p.120]

The Gris Gris are a challenging, intense proposition. [Jan 2006, p.113]

The best you can say is that it's a great marketing ploy. [Dec 2005, p.112]

It seems something of a hollow exercise. [Feb 2006, p.72]

An outstanding record which you'd be unwise to miss. [Aug 2004, p.91]

What little humanity Colder once possessed has been erased. [Jul 2005, p.96]

Lookaftering is some kind of miracle. [Nov 2005, p.100]

If last year's engrossing, infuriating Blueberry Boat revealed the Friedbergers as a uniquely strange and perversely ambitious proposition, Rehearsing My Choir, remarkably, trumps it, striking a chord of real feeling alongside the pell-mell fabulation. [Dec 2005, p.110]

What elevates Rogue Wave above the pale massed ranks of the wispy and fey, though, are melodies with real muscle, and a muscial ambition that flirts with the experimental, but remains joyously within reach of the FM dial. [Dec 2005, p.112]

The songs often seem over-anxious to build to show-stopping choruses. [Nov 2005, p.94]

Feels depends on a balancing act between brilliance and whimsy, and some may need convincing that a purposely childlike band... is not twee. [Nov 2005, p.110]

Occasionally, they lapse into their own shuffling comfort zone, but there's always a pixel-level attention to detail here. [Nov 2005, p.102]

A pleasant surprise: engaging, exciting, and a much better album than most bands can muster after 25 years together. [Nov 2005, p.106]

A moody and restrained affair. [Oct 2005, p.108]

Their heaviest to date. [Nov 2005, p.108]

A surreal, tender, revealing record. [Nov 2005, p.104]

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

In general, the album's too bare, reserved and repetitive to be easily loved by many. But it is brave, from a man still in motion. [Oct 2005, p.104]

A curiously anemic listen. [Feb 2006, p.78]

Beguiling. [Oct 2005, p.107]

The world is certainly overdue proper acquaintance with The Constantines. [Nov 2005, p.98]

This is MF Doom's most accessible moment to date. [Nov 2005, p.108]

The Runners Four displays intuitive melody and a childlike disregard for convention that's captivating enough to overcome any saccharine tendencies. [Dec 2005, p.116]

The album's meandering latter stages drag a little, but overall Cinder provides a grand musical landscape. [Nov 2005, p.114]

Neither embarrassing nor unenjoyable, then, but still an exercise bearing a cautionary sting. [Nov 2005, p.98]

Keys hasn't the charisma to indulge in the inter-song banter here, which breaks up any soulful flow that might develop despite her sharp, hectoring vocals. [Jan 2006, p.108]

A work of rejuvenating power on which Weller and his long-serving band attain a new sense of purpose and focus. [Nov 2005, p.94]

Starts powerfully... [but] fizzles out with corny ballads. [Nov 2005, p.111]

Fans of Fad Gadget and Add N To (X) take note. [Nov 2005, p.108]

In taming their eccentricity, Dios (Malos) have also lost some of their dreamy romanticism along the way. [Mar 2006, p.98]

Early Man pull off metal with a back-to-basics swagger--even if their relentless assault does get a bit samey by the end. [Nov 2005, p.111]

Dark cabaret with an unhinged, dervish energy. [Feb 2006, p.70]

Unlike the solar-powered efforts of The Thrills or The Polyphonic Spree, they understand, like The Beach Boys before them, that the best way to soundtrack a broken heart is to drench it in sunny three-part harmonies. [Jul 2005, p.102]

There's now a sardonic wit to these break-up ballads. [Dec 2005, p.120]

There's a real effort to forge beauty out of chaos without losing any of the chaos. [Album of the Month, Jan 2006, p.100]

As strong as this record is, there's a way to go to make good on the promise of its title. [Nov 2005, p.92]

Working with a major label has brought a new sheen to the Ladytronic wall of sound. [Oct 2005, p.94]

[A] triumphant resurrection. [Nov 2005, p.96]

There's nothing particularly profound here, but the combination of skanking, roots-reggae rhythms and O'Connor's still-gorgeous voice... is a winning one. [Nov 2005, p.106]

Contains the usual assortment of slurred tirades and workmanlike riffs, but it also features a smattering of minor Smith classics. [Nov 2005, p.96]

Lurch[es] from homecooked early Beck to the expansive hooks of Brian Wilson or Todd Rundgren. [Dec 2005, p.104]

Emily Haines is still secretly one of the most articulate, compelling performers in modern rock. [Feb 2006, p.70]

In among the glitch and twitch, however, lies the odd choice moment. [Nov 2005, p.114]

There is far too much going on at times. [Oct 2005, p.96]

Altogether lacking... is the crisp production that powered early hits like "Boo!", replaced by a rather unremarkable R&B job. [Nov 2005, p.94]

Musically at least, [Jacksonville] confirms Adams' restoration to rude health. [Oct 2005, p.106]

A cohesive album that is simultaneously Big Star-ish (but not slavishly so) and Chilton-like (but not depressingly so). [Oct 2005, p.98]

The finest moments... prove to be the same stripped-down verbally deft hip-hop that made their name. [Oct 2005, p.100]

Wildflower is more satisfying, less self-consciously searching for radio-friendliness [than C'Mon C'mon]. [Nov 2005, p.100]

An essential half-term report. [Nov 2005, p.94]

Witty, tragi-comic lyrics layered over busy beats, strings and electronic flourishes which never sacrifice intimacy. [Nov 2005, p.114]

Like most of their work, it all sounds teasingly familiar. [Jun 2005, p.97]

All in all, another album of low-key brilliance. [Sep 2005, p.114]

Frequently appealing. [Nov 2005, p.103]

Deep, warm, fully rounded and with no slack, Prairie Wind is Neil at his best. [Oct 2005, p.101]

The trio has acquired the confidence to cherry-pick tropes from dark-rock's heritage and mould them into thier own glum grooves. [Mar 2006, p.100]

Sisters Of Mercy fans will remain defiantly nonplussed. [Nov 2005, p.103]

Things go downhill as petty vindictiveness and insignificant beefs become the preferred themes. [Jan 2006, p.114]

Pleasantly discreet, resolutely unengaging. [Oct 2005, p.107]

Despite this record's twilight charms, the group may need to become more expansive if they want to head further out there. [Oct 2005, p.96]

McCulloch's misplaced his mystique, and resembles a pub singer with an over-extended tab, while Sergeant's guitar lines settle lazily at long-drawn borders. [Oct 2005, p.94]

Another blast of super-slick soul. [Aug 2005, p.102]

Every element of Certified is exaggerated.... It frequently makes for energised hip hop. [Jan 2006, p.105]

Stupendously silly but... indisputably proficient. [Nov 2005, p.103]

His is a gentler, pastoral treat. [Nov 2005, p.111]

A sweatstorm of strum and twang. [Dec 2005, p.106]

If there's a signpost that Cripple Crow isn't quite the record it could've been, it's that the most engaging moments here recall Banhart records past. [Oct 2005, p.96]

Brakes sound like The Jesus & Mary Chain with Tourette's. [Aug 2005, p.102]