Some of his most seductive melodies to date. [Jan 2020, p.28]

However minor these 45s may have seemed at the time, together they constitute a major discovery for any soul fan regardless of his or her denomination (or utter lack thereof). [Oct 2019, p.50]

Every song here has its merits; there isn't a dud among them. [Oct 2019, p.40]

Though still meditative, they're now more dynamic. [Jan 2020, p.24]

It doesn't always hit the mark, but it's terrific fun while it lasts. [Jan 2020, p.30]

Well-crafted compositions. [Jan 2019, p.31]

Bold. ... But Ism is finest when at its funkiest. [Jan 2020, p.28]

Wet Tuna really find their sound in the spacier moments. [Nov 2019, p.33]

This anthology perfectly encapsulates The Go-Betweens' irresistible, evergreen and still expanding appeal. [Jan 2020, p.34]

It's sometimes more about the journey than the getting there, and the contents of this latest Bowie box help document many of the steps. ... The 1969 Space Oddity record remains more than its title track, the tender love songs particularly strong. It's a hippie record of social observation and heavy inner trips, Bowie's wit and tenderness rendering it a cut above. [Dec 2019, p.41]

They still sound unique today. [Jan 2019, p.41]

Some of them meet him in his world, while others drag him into theirs. ... A third way to approach these songs: Fiona Apple and Robbie Fulks manage to pretend that their world is Mose's. [Jan 2020, p.24]

It's a mix that captures the zeitgeist appetite for the melding of jazz, R&B and electronic sounds while also celebrating the path that led there. [Jan 2020, p.31]

Revitalising his finest work with unlikely guests performing unlikely roles. [Jan 2020, p.31]

The live setting and frontman Joe Talbot's inter-song exhortations heighten the feeling of being sucked into communal catharsis. [Jan 2020, p.26]

Unfussy yet poetic. [Aug 2019, p.31]

An intense and dizzying work. [Jan 2020, p.26]

Every song here is a miniature gem of its kind. [Nov 2019, p.22]

[Rainford] was haled as a return to form, and Heavy Rain--an album of re-versions helmed by Sherwood accompanied by a suite of guests--feels similarly vital. [Jan 2020, p.28]

A mutant strain of noisy funk, hip-hop, subversive art punk and dirty disco. [Dec 2019, p.35]

Poet Joshua Idehen adds desperate, apocalyptic testimony to the opening of "All That Matters Is The Moments," while "The Lifeforce Part I" and "II" gradually dial up the intensity, Hutchings blowing with dervish energy as drums and synth lock into a spiraling groove. [Jan 2020, p.25]

Shlon is in some senses a return to his roots, combining the lush Arabic romance poetry of collaborator Moussa al Mardoud with Hasan Alo's techno arrangements. [Jan 2020, p.28]

It's his terrific wordplay--sharp, funny, poignant and much more--that really dazzles. [Dec 2019, p.29]

These are quite logical, tuneful explorations. [Dec 2019, p.32]

Sounds great, but a little superfluous. [Jan 2020, p.28]

An intriguingly diverse "double" (well, 53 minutes) album. [Jan 2019, p.25]

It brings together the many facets of Sudan Archives--religious and sensual, independent and codependent, tender and menacing--in a way that feels very deliberate, particularly when you learn that the final tracklisting was whittled down from around 60 potential songs. [Dec 2019, p.28]

Another graceful tug-of-war between sentimental melody and muscular noise. [Jan 2020, p.25]

The resulting album is a thing of gossamer beauty. [Dec 2019, p.25]

Lovely stuff. [Dec 2019, p.29]

It's spellbinding, shiver-down-the-spine stuff, and enough to have any self-respecting Quadropheniac dusting down their scooter for one last run down to Brighton. ... Their best since Quadrophenia, then. [Dec 2019, p.22]

Hyperspace never feels over calculated or overdressed. Instead, it's the work of an artist who sounds fully re-engaged. [Jan 2020, p.20]

Thanks For The Dance has the intimacy that characterised Songs Of Leonard Cohen and Songs From A Room half a century ago, only rarely making the listener conscious of the resources at Adam Cohen's command. [Jan 2020, p.14]

Striking enough on their own merits, free of embellishments, all the more powerful for the immediacy of the moment. Simplicity is the key here. [Jan 2020, p.26]

Appealing collection of African folk songs played on curiously tuned guitars and percussion fashioned from farm implements by a trio of survivors from Rwanda's ruinous genocide. [Dec 2019, p.27]

This 50th anniversary reissue of their faultless second LP still digs deep to find six unreleased studio cuts. [Jan 2020, p.39]

Some will prefer the stripped-back, elemental performances that are compiled on the extra disc, and they are certainly magnificent recordings in their own right. But part of No Other's magic is its ambition. [Dec 2019, p.36]

Wood is in his element, delivering needle sharp licks and belting the classic, while a passing Imelda May adds some serious sizzle to "We Wee Hours." [Dec 2019, p.35]

Largely recorded over six fays in Paris, it adds test-card breeziness to the bleakness of "The Amputees," and delivers a gorgeous rumination on shattered love in "Carousel." [Dec 2019, p.32]

Ultimately it's all a matter of taste, but fans will lap this up. [Jan 2020, p.31]

As the strident piano ballads and flatly aggressive production pound on, though, it's more AGT than Kanye. [Jan 2020, p.25]

Even without the dramatic backstory, heart-tugging earworms like "All Thing New" and "Purifier" work on their own terms as healing meditations. [Jan 2020, p.23]

Disturbing, but also enthralling. [Jan 2020, p.23]

What might feel somewhat reheated is saved thanks to Dal Forno's poise. [Jan 2020, p.25]

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

Though not as viscerally crushing as A Crow Looked At Me, Lost Wisdom Pt 2 is as plainly poetic. [Jan 2020, p.27]

Simple folk arrangements foregrounding Moorer's richly emotive voice. [Jan 2020, p.27]

Grace Potter returns to her stylistic comfort zone with Daylight. [Jan 2020, p.28]

If its pace is funeral, though, its mood is elevating. [Jan 2020, p.31]

Approached with an open mind, it becomes a compelling blend of ambience, minimalism, poetry and devotion. [Dec 2019, p.32]

Her reinterpretations restore some of the post-punk edge to a band long overshadowed by its frontman's solo hubris. [Dec 2019, p.29]

The greatest compliment it can be paid is that it sounds like no time at all separates it from its predecessor. It's a(nother) fine album of gently joyous country songs. [Dec 2019, p.25]

Proceeds with the unhurried observational vividness of extended takes in a Richard Linklater film. [Dec 2019, p.35]

Their fourth LP together sees them ditch the punky uptempo tracks and instead wallow in mournful, funereal meditations that don't leave White with much to do. [Dec 2019, p.35]

The result is a heady debut album. [Dec 2019, p.27]

A Son tilts slightly more towards conventional song structure, minimising electronics in favour of (mostly) acoustic guitars. [Dec 2019, p.30]

Impressively inventive and diverse material. [Dec 2019, p.35]

Splendid. ... All the crafty hooks, Haim-worthy vocal harmonies, sumptuous layers of synths and unabashedly prefab beats belie the poignant nature of Girl Ray's odes to post-millennial love and longing. [Dec 2019, p.26]

This anniversary reissue is less concerned about the album as it is and more curious about how it might have sounded. ... Arguably the most revealing aspect of this reissue is Scott Litt's bold remix of Monster. [Dec 2019, p.40]

Musically, Wildcard is all over the place00and that might be its best quality. She ties all these various sounds and styles and settings together by sheer force of will and one of Nashville's mightiest twangs. [Dec 2019, p.26]

Lynne is at his best as the world's greatest Beatles tribute act. [Dec 2019, p.26]

It's all very wry, but rather endearingly so. [Dec 2019, p.30]

Each mode works in service of the vibe Cohen intends, but Spring's organic easiness belies the evident care in its creation. [Dec 2019, p.24]

Some good songs emerge--"Ego Central High" is a glammy gem that makes its repetitiveness a virtue--but otherwise this is heavy listening that too often edges towards stodge. [Dec 2019, p.29]

There's a defiance in each painful note. In tasting despair, Tahliah Barnett has returned 10 times stronger--in spirit and voice. [Dec 2019, p.27]

Surprises may be fewer this time around but, with their warmth and grace, "Wanted Never Asked" and "Filigree" are two of several songs here that rank with Cabic's finest. [Dec 2019, p.35]

The template remains intact, with monotony fundamental: The Necks lend the title track's repetitions a shimmering, slowly evolving transcendence, Anna Von Hauswolff and sister maria provide bloodcurdling shrieks on the devastating, pummelling "Sunfucker," and Baby Dee adds voodoo magic to "The Nub." [Dec 2019, p.32]

Played and sun with unassuming grace, it's an album of rare generosity. [Nov 2019, p.30]

Very much a Van Morrison album, and a pretty decent Van Morrison album at that, tapping into that apparently inextinguishable reservoir of muscular yet crotchety blues. [Dec 2019, p.30]

As is the case with most of his releases the past decade or so, Ringo addresses his own career with a heavy dose of nostalgia. [Dec 2019, p.32]

It's a strong, seductive set, with the soul-blues burn of "Prophet" and tender "If You Think It's Love" standouts. [Dec 2019, p.29]

Dave Brock's outfit are still hot-wiring the same motorik grooves and primitive electronics that helped jump-start the counterculture in the first place. [Nov 2019, p.27]

The Livelong Day is dark, powerful and disquieting stuff that resonates long after its final note has subsided. [Nov 2019, p.31]

The results may comprise the most finely distilled example of Stephen O'Malley and Greg Anderson's deconstruction of heavy riffage, with each of these tracks demonstrating the infinite varieties of fuzz and rumble that exist within a single mighty note. [Nov 2019, p.33]

Laid-back and loose maybe, but neither lazy nor lacklustre. [Dec 2019, p.33]

Like its predecessor, FIBS is a stubbornly uncategorisable hybrid of styles, tempos and angles on the traditional "song." [Dec 2019, p.30]

The resultant raggedy, in-the-moment feel suits the Neil Young-ish "Show Me" and harmonica-hinged "Guardian Well," as well as "I've Got Reason," less so "Feel It All," which drags its feet over five minutes. "Lost A year" is a sax-assisted winner, though. [Nov 2019, p.24]

If the tunes don't all stun as surely this time around, lyrically they're bolder. [Dec 2019, p.25]

Kiwanuka is loaded with memorable songs, but the best way to experience them is by listening to the album from start to finish. [Nov 2019, p.26]

Wave finds beauty in the belief that all's not lost. [Dec 2019, p.35]

It's a polite, rather repressed formulation and the most appealing moments come when they go off-piste. [Dec 2019, p.32]

An unabashed old-school West Coast rock'n'roll record. [Dec 2019, p.29]

Timeless, tender and sparse. [Dec 2019, p.35]

Spending a little too long in the shallows of pastel-shaded easy-listening minimalism. That said, there are sublimely beautiful and lightly experimental touches here too. [Dec 2019, p.30]

Song structures are over-egged, resulting in blunted hooks and lost momentum. [Dec 2019, p.25]

It is raw, but also synthetic. There are a number of very long songs,m verbal rambles, but the music fills in, disturbing the melancholy of Cave's piano with static interruptions that owe as much to cave and Warren's film soundtracks as they do to the Bad Seeds' more conventional songcraft. [Dec 2019, p.18]

If Psychedelic Pill was among his longest, strangest trips, Colorado has more rustic charms--Harvest Moon or Prairie Wind, but hopped up on guitars. [Nov 2019, p.16]

Doesn't reveal itself in haste but rather unfolds over time and through multitudinous layers. [Nov 2019, p.23]

Another delightful exercise in musical brevity and lyrical snark. [Oct 2019, p.24]

Opulent, perverse and reassuringly other-worldly. [Oct 2019, p.30]

Guitarists Rich Robinson and Marc Ford, bassist Sven Pipien and the three seasoned players they've recruited stretch out stylistically on the sequel. [Nov 2019, p.28]

Across this record, you could spend days unravelling the songwriting. [Nov 2019, p.22]

As ever, the technical chops are indisputable--but it does, with fewer brains on board, feel somehow less substantial. [Nov 2019, p.22]

Shepherd's most eclectic album to date, a richly pleasurable balancing act between brain and body, academic seminar and night club, cerebral experiment and sensory feast. [Nov 2019, p.32]

Ten-minute sonic odyssey "Neptune" provides a typically overblown finale, but it's INXS-style banger "The Runner" that will further cement their place at indie rock's top table. [Nov 2019, p.25]

Following on from a 2017 album of standards, this chiefly replaces covers with original compositions and adds a meaningful, Slint-like loitering on chord to his repertoire of shattered blues licks. [Nov 2019, p.30]

Dawson's most direct album to date. ... It's hard not to conclude that 2020 is the record we need now: a state-of-the-nation address for a nation in a bit of a state. [Nov 2019, p.20]

This is a corporeal and cacophonic record, but all ear-bleeding mayhem it isn't. ... Lightning Bolt continue to spark. [Nov 2019, p.28]