There's an appealingly alien quality to Joyfultalk's third album, a sound that drifts beyond familiar reference points. [Apr 2020, p.28]

With a touch of the sinister, James' voice swerves through a spectrum of wild emotions; folk, blues and a dreamy, eerie style of pop wind their way through everything here. [Apr 2020, p.27]

The result is, as much as you'd expect, elegant and tranquil. [Apr 2020, p.27]

Showing off a musical muscularity built up from three years on the road. [Feb 2020, p.35]

Dury seems to have found a tone and groove that he's both relishing and flourishing in. [Apr 2020, p.27]

A dazzling return. [Apr 2020, p.30]

Intriguing. [Mar 2020, p.27]

The overarching atmosphere is masterful, a sense of brimming anxiety that unites even as it unsettles. [Apr 2020, p.37]

Sonically it's a sinister palette: classical folk laced with dynamite blasts of electronics. Yet, the inner contents are tender. [Apr 2020, p.37]

Crunching glam riffs, foot-stamping choruses and lip-smacking vocals - delivered with trademark gusto by Bob Geldof. [Apr 2020, p.25]

Feels like a peculiar reprise of [2007's Tromatic Reflexxions]. [Mar 2020, p.35]

This is an impeccably put-together record. [Apr 2020, p.37]

The record features contributions from a host of their pals, such as The Orb's Alex Paterson on the blissed-out "Burnt Umber," writer Vivien Goldman on Bizarro Bond-theme "Rhino" and Alabama 3's Aurora Dawn on reggae spiritual "Keep On Moving." [Apr 2020, p.37]

While Hutchings' trademark, frantically circling sax figures are prominent, it's the album's sombre moments that prove the most powerful. [Apr 2020, p.35]

This delightfully unlikely collaboration is as much fun to listen to as you suspect it was to make. [Apr 2020, p.26]

The record is awash with sparkling, instantly memorable melodies. [Apr 2020, p.28]

The songs are uniformly strong, for one thing; the delivery is smart, a kind of airy, gently gothic arch-pop, completed by Jean's conversational vocals. It's a wonderfully dynamic set of songs. [Apr 2020, p.28]

An engaging thing it is too. [Apr 2020, p.28]

Unexpected digressions often invigorate their third full-length. [Apr 2020, p.28]

Every note of this album is saturated with a very particular melancholy that keeps these spacey songs closely anchored to the earth. [Apr 2020, p.28]

Ideas fly out of Collector at a dizzying pace. [Apr 2020, p.27]

The lyrics are presented with such conviction that it becomes quietly devastating. Rather like Swamp Dogg himself. [Apr 2020, p.24]

A set of 12 colour-saturated, avant electronic-soul tracks, where Sumney's extraordinary voice is strong, clear and central to the mix rather than one element of it. [Apr 2020, p.37]

A joyous album, one that doesn't wander off along unnecessary tangents and keeps their indulgence in check. [Apr 2020, p.29]

The wry, heartfelt "Cash Up" and truly touching "Amberjack" are highlights; that he exits on the breezy, sardonic bonus track "Juliefuckingette" is a reminder, though, that yes, it's still Malkmus. [Apr 2020, p.30]

An audaciously original album - a bedroom-laptop fever dream from a parallel universe. [Apr 2020, p.33]

This set traces a downward trajectory toward disco, but every album has its highlights. [Mar 2020, p.47]

There are many timeless, brilliant moments. [Mar 2020, p.45]

A cornucopia of delights from a band with an unerring ear for melody, undervalued in their heyday. [Mar 2020, p.49]

If there are occasions when the rugged soloing gets a little bogged down in detail, there are many others where the trio achieve moments of adrenalising magic.

Out Of My Province retains the earthen quality of her previous works, but with an added confidence, her words enunciated with a newfound assurance. [Apr 2020, p.22]

Heavy Light is no one-note affair. ... Artfully honest songs. [Apr 2020, p.36]

It's clear Masin has not catered to his new hipster audience but rather remained true to his elemental vision. [Mar 2020, p.33]

Listeners seeking more of those exquisite harmonies are well served by glorious opening track "Silver," among others. [Apr 2020, p.35]

Touches of stoner metal in "Four Strangers Enter The Cement At Dusk" or a deeper psychedelic bent on "Harsho" offer variety, but the name of the game is sheer glee. [Apr 2020, p.37]

A poignant folk-jazz take on Billie Holiday's "God Bless The Child" is the standout and it's all impeccably tasteful - but in a threadbare kind of way. [Apr 2020, p.37]

What it sometimes lacks in surprise, it makes up for in consistency. [Mar 2020, p.30]

Cray's oft-overlooked voice croons with rare tenderness over the Bobby "Blue" Bland cut "You're The One," and there's a spiky funk to Don Gardner's "My Baby Likes To Boogaloo." But Cray's own compositions are just as striking. [Apr 2020, p.26]

Not so much an electronic supergroup, more a retro-futurist sonic museum. It uses Benge's collection of antique analogue synthesisers to create some pulsating dance music. [Apr 2020, p.37]

Layered guitars make s luscious soundtrack to get lost in, but relatable lyrics will guide you home. [Mar 2020, p.25]

This lovingly compiled box is the perfect place for anyone curious about The Staple Singers' remarkable 50-year career to get acquainted. [Feb 2020, p.46]

Mixes magic and sci-fi, beauty and horror. [Mar 2020, p.35]

There's another clutch of great Real Estate songs on this gentle delight, and some clues as to where the group could go next, if they chose to really stretch out and see what else their songs could do. [Apr 2020, p.34]

Mostly it's ambient background music in search of a movie, but standout moments include the sinister Marricone guitars on "The Prairie" and the distorted tablas and minimalistic vibraphones on "Damascene Slap." [Mar 2020, p.33]

Dare's songwriting feels to be improving, even as he pares his music to the bare essentials. [Mar 2020, p.26]

Suggest the euphoria of whooshing through infinite space past astral displays of imagined beauty via a blend of disco funk, dream pop, electronic exotica and '70s highlife. [Apr 2020, p.33]

An enticing hint at other directions that Landreth could go in. [Mar 2020, p.30]

I kept wishing I'd been there that night, 45 years ago. [Mar 2020, p.42]

Lyrically, the rose-tinted specs are off but sonically it has a romantic, decidedly retro bent, with reverb and (fine) vocal harmonies wrapped around songs that recall Shangri-Las, a stripped-back Lush and a less morose Cowboy Junkies. [Mar 2020, p.33]

Sparse and otherworldly, yet powerful and dynamic. [Mar 2020, p.24]

12 luminous and inventive songs. [Mar 2020, p.36]

While the Joe Pizzulo-fronted "Love came Between Us" may sound like it once soundtracked an '80s romcom, that somehow adds to its retro charm. [Apr 2020, p.33]

Alongside warm, grunge-pop songs sit the reverb-and-ambient-noise bath that is "Night Swimming," the tripped-out psych folk of "Lucy" and hugely poignant epic" Yellow Is The Color Of Her Eyes." [Apr 2020, p.35]

Companion Rises is unmistakably Chasney's journey, and it's wonderful to come along for the ride. [Mar 2020, p.34]

Good-natured album. [Apr 2020, p.35]

Smart and slick but vulnerable too, it's the point where Blonde On Blonde meets Voulez-Vous. [Apr 2020, p.33]

Nothing is forced and no sound is extraneous on this desert-dry, whisper-close 12-song set. [Apr 2020, p.30]

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]

Lush as it sometimes is, too often disappears into an indecipherable cloud of smoke. [Apr 2020, p.30]

He thrives in intimate surroundings, furnishing these songs with discreet and sometimes adventurous embellishments - drum machine, say - that enhance his message, rather than detract from it. [Apr 2020, p.26]

As always, her lyrics are unambiguous - too on-the-nose for some - but there's an admirable unfussiness to it all. [Apr 2020, p.23]

Succeeds in painting atmospheric images, with elliptical poetry set against dreamy FX-laden guitars, twinkly pianos and jagged beats. [Mar 2020, p.30]

Dulli remains a restless and unpredictable frontman, constantly distorting his voice from a soaring falsetto into a bellowing bass, as though he's just getting started. [Mar 2020, p.27]

Crafting a sound that is brash in its bigness, massive in its attack. [Mar 2020, p.29]

Ranaldo's spoken-word ambles can feel a bit precious, and at times the material doesn't cohere--a natural risk with experimentations. But when it falls together, it's beguiling. [Mar 2020, p.35]

This Yorkshire quartet's debut deserves similar acclaim to Shame, Idles, Fontaines DC and their ilk. [Mar 2020, p.33]

It's hugely impressive and would certainly suit a fully dramatised staging. [Mar 2020, p.30]

Moore's delicately stylish piano lines and Liz Fraser-style vocal hiccups combine seductively. [Mar 2020, p.37]

An intoxicating blend of surf-rock guitar and the blusterous post-rock drama of forefathers such as Lift To Experience; a bewitching blend that makes death's ominous presence feel that much closer. [Mar 2020, p.25]

The album isn't presented in chronological order, which makes it harder to discern changes in style and lineup, but does demonstrate the consistency of Wheeler's writing over a long period of time. [Mar 2020, p.43]

It's a rare thrill to come across a time capsule like Dancing Mogadishu, , particularly when its contents appeals to funk connoisseurs and cultural anthropologists as much as the casual listener. Feb 2020, p.48]

This is not pastiche or revival - this is jazz created in a distinctly London accent; the sounds you hear in cars and minicabs, the fractured beats you hear pouring out of teenagers' phones - refracted through the prism of jazz. [Mar 2020, p.28]

It's one for the lonesome and broken-hearted, a great excuse to shut out the world and have a good cry. [Mar 2020, p.35]

Though not as daring as the Pole's free-jazz output, this gilded modular synthesis is a safe and satisfying listen that pushes him into another realm. [Mar 2020, p.37]

He has risen to the occasion with an album full of the necessary girth and scope, which doesn't succumb to the forces of inertia. [Mar 2020, p.18]

Fu Chronicles is further proof that Antibalas is the best Afrobeat group in the West. [Mar 2020, p.23]

Half Moon Light's much-needed manifesto of hopefulness comes with the addition of uplifting lyrics further designed to keep up our spirits on dark days. [Mar 2020, p.30]

The result is akin to Super Furry Animals making progressive post-punk. The sense of charm and idiosyncrasy is plentiful across the rest of the album too. [Mar 2020, p.29]

A taut, lean 30-minute manifesto of a record which contains some of their most tuneful, groove-oriented songs yet. [Mar 2020, p.32]

Besides being vivid demonstrations of her versatility, the girl-group pop of "Hey World," the country-gospel of "The Heart Of It All" and the delicate chamber-folk of "Just for Today" all provide very good reasons to welcome her back. [Mar 2020, p.26]

Literate, idiosyncratic power pop, ploughed from a furrow between Fountains of Wayne and The Posies. [Mar 2020, p.33]

Feels like a decisive clean break. [Mar 2020, p.30]

There's always a glimpse of the human in Popp's music, an organic feel that gives a sense of a hand at the controls. [Mar 2020, p.33]

They sound as Zappa seldom does: not over-thinking it, and guilelessly lost in the moment and in the exuberant joy of the playing. [Feb 2020, p.40]

Field recordings and ghostly cello further underline "Ghosts of Blaker Dyke"'s poignancy, recalling David Sylvian's instrumentals on Gone To Earth. [Mar 2020, p.29]

Call it an expansion rather than a reinvention--but it's a dramatic and rather dazzling one. [Mar 2020, p.27]

As a whole, West of Eden is extravagant and ridiculous, but it embraces its own erraticism. [Mar 2020, p.29]

Opening up the album to new ideas and interpretations without obscuring the man himself. [Mar 2020, p.35]

Karen's spectral, childlike voice sounds like it's been beamed in from a haunted 19th-century log cabin. [Feb 2020, p.29]

It's an album that delights, challenges and provokes, while reimagining old folk traditions. [Feb 2020, p.35]

Unorthodox methods prove highly persuasive. [Mar 2020, p.27]

Fuses the hormonal aggression that put Green Day on the map with punched-up modern-day production courtesy of Butch Walker and a razor-sharp mix by Tchad Blake. [Mar 2020, p.29]

Fearless seldom surprises--he's been doing this kind of thing long enough to know what works--but is quality is consistent. [Dec 2019, p.26]

Britfolk's most adventurous neo-traditionalist takes the surprise quotient to new heights on this conceptual set. [Feb 2020, p.30]

A real joy, though it bears an inevitable sadness. [Feb 2020, p.25]

By facing up to their demons, they've recaptured what made them special. [Mar 2020, p.37]

If you like your pop super-sweet and synthy, fill your boots. [Mar 2020, p.25]

Evokes Watt's early mentor Robert Wyatt at his most enthralling and adventurous. [Mar 2020, p.37]