Beck appears on half the tracks –his deadpan gospel is especially discernible on “Beautiful People (Stay High)” – Noel Gallagher on three songs, and an invigorating hip-hop influence is contributed by Juicy J, Lil Noid and Dan The Automator. The sum of these disparate parts is an album with that infectious quality of sounding like it was a total blast to make. [Apr 2024, p.29]

Characterised by a laid-back, full-band sound, this heartfelt music exudes the warm thrill of catching up and looking back among old friends. [Apr 2024, p.35]

The veteran New York trio draws from synth-pop, to pomp rock, yet somehow turns the wildly disparate source material into a coherent album that doubles as a tribute to their own roots in The Byrds and Big Star. [May 2010, p.99]

Jain often subverts the placid mood with playful details, like the fractalised vocals that fill "Our Touching Tongues" or the synth arpeggios that add a sprightly energy throughout. [Apr 2024, p.35]

The Mods return with fury unabated. [Apr 2023, p.36]

Gedge hasn't sounded this belligerently broken-hearted since 1987's "My Favourite Dress." [Mar 2005, p.100]

A beautifully languid collaboration with three members of his Lighthouse band. [Dec 2018, p.23]

A joyous, uninhibited and painlessly adventurous ride. [Oct 2005, p.124]

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

New collaborations from Noah & The Whale to Conor O'Brien, are worth the price of admission. [Dec 2011, p.82]

His most visceral album in years. [Jun 2021, p.28]

It's an inspired rather than gimmicky conceit. [Feb 2015, p.71]

It's halfway between Kim Wilde and truly wild, and, as such, hugely entertaining. [Oct 2010, p.97]

If the dark intensity leans close to self-parody at times, there are enough musical surprises to bring some light to Lanegan's darkness. [Jun 2020, p.33]

A cracking selection of scuzzy, fuzzy, psych-rock songs that recall Royal Trux and Sonic Youth. [Apr 2013]

Classy Americana with a restless pulse and a passionate heart. [Jan 2024, p.33]

It's the record fans of her explosive live shows always hoped she would make and a career highlight. [May 2013, p.79]

Like 2010's The Shine and 2013's Hoodoo, Rain Crow is thick with nervous trepidation, ominous trips into the rural mindset. [Jul 2016, p.82]

Simple Songs is a major statement from a brilliant, mischievous singer-songwriter. [Jul 2015, p.80]

Theirs is a maniacal mish-mash of seemingly incompatible musical styles--Krautrock, psychedelia, no-wave, prog, synth-pop, '70s stoner rock and punk--wrought from a deeply felt, genre-leaping love of challenge. [Feb 2004, p.80]

Warm, fuzzy and delicious. [May 2023, p.31]

It represents Lauderdale travelling full circle, coming 30 years after his first recordings with bluegrass legend Roland white, but with a few of the flourishes he brought to Elvis Costello's recent touring outfit The Sugarcanes. [Oct 2011, p.91]

Charmingly wistful and twitchily rhythmic pop songs. [Nov 2015, p.71]

By turns darker and more challenging than 2003's dazzling Electric Version. [Oct 2005, p.96]

The band's blend of psychedelia and angular guitar menace is invigorating. [Jan 2006, p.112]

His verse is relentlessly positivistic and hippy-ish (“I go forward in the courage of my love”), delivered in a conspiratorial whisper, but the highlight is the backing, which drifts between spiritual jazz, skeletal dub and folksy minimalism, all the time featuring Fairbairn’s quiet, quavering tenor sax improvisations. [May 2022, p.26]

In practice, it's suggestive of the luvved-up terrace thug moment of the late '80s, but with the ultraviolence retained. [Dec 2012, p.67]

It's a typical cyclical riff and chant but, unlike other Tuareg bands, driven by full drums. Elsewhere, the quieter "Achaka Achail Aynaian Daghchilan" comes complete with subtle blues flourishes. [Nov 2013, p.79]

Packing 14 tracks into 38 minutes, it's very much a sprint, the breathlessness part of its impact, despite this intensity, mainman Jack McEwan steers SHYGA!... clear of excess and keeps his ear on melody throughout. [Apr 2021, p.34]

If art is love, and love is art, then this hyper-stylised, characteristically idiosyncratic break-up album, in the end makes a perfect kind of sense. [Mar 2017, p.36]

This is a generous, curious and commendably weird LP. [Jul 2022, p.26]

Delicately arranged, and sympathetically drenched in reverb by producer Jason Quever, its six tracks find him in typically hushed mood. [Feb 2014, p.83]

Voice and piano are to the fore, but Wasser's orchestrations pulse and ebb like living things. [July 2008, p.102]

A lucid and accomplished departure. [Mar 2015, p.76]

Ten dark and lovely reasons why love hurts. [Apr 2015, p.84]

Marling's fifth takes vast steps forward musically, as ever. It's more defiant and distinct than anything she's done before. [Apr 2015, p.74]

Niño’s adventurous, meditative spirit is a worthwhile companion for Ntuli’s masterful piano and expressive voice, resulting in an album that is vivid and subdued in equal measure, the vitality of a battle cry rendered as a warm embrace. [Jan 2024, p.29]

We have properly zippy bangers for the moshpit in Atomic Revelations, These Scars Won't Define Us and the monstrous Addicted To Pain - but there's exploration aplenty here, abd the band sound all the better for it. [Jun 2025, p.103]

An uncommonly thoughtful victory lap, which deserves--and has received--a handsome recorded memorial.

It's genuinely smart, intriguingly playful set that both presses all the right Big Pop buttons and sounds decidedly off-centre. [Jul 2017, p.36]

Bold and Breathtaking [Jul 2025, p.26]

The results are as charming as they are accessible. [Feb 2003, p.86]

Audacious and urgent. [Jun 2013, p.74]

There's a strangely disarming quality to Rose Windows' second album. [Jun 2015, p.80]

Send is pure gristle, a vicious statement of musical intent. [Jul 2003, p.129]

The use of reverberant instruments such as marima, bells and steel drums--as well as, on "Stick To My Side," the ethreal vocals of Noah 'Panda Beear" Lennox--give a real depth to his ambitious productions, and yet despite the elemental yearning, they retain a clubby toughness. Breth-taking stuff. [Mar 2010, p.90]

In essence, Ice On The Dune is pure pop with a twist--like a modern day 10cc, or ELO using synths instead of strings. [Jul 2013, p.75]

More subdued yet equally captivating follow-up. [Oct 2019, p.24]

This is sombre and beautiful music.... A Lifetime is satisfying as an encyclopaedia of Low, to be dipped into now and again. [Aug 2004, p.118]

[A] ravishing debut album. [Sep 2015, p.73]

The Old Magic won't do his reputation any harm. [Oct 2011, p.91]

An unambiguously terrific album. [Nov 2015, p.78]

Eternally Even affords James the opportunity to take his music to places My Morning Jacket are less likely to inhabit. The result being that his solo albums are rapidly becoming profound statements in themselves, rather than mere sideshows to the main event. [Dec 2016, p.31]

Most of the album sees producers Charles Webster and Ewan Pearson buiilding on the bedsit rave of "Missing" and the beatific drum'n'bass of Walking Wounded. [Apr 2007, p.120]

Not every track is killer, but even the filler fascinates.

It bubbles with conviction, the mock-fearsome, statuesque diva loading her lyrics with Prince-like panche. [Nov 2008, p.105]

Spaces Everywhere has arch, but craft aplenty. [Apr 2015, p.80]

It's clear that Brown is still capable of being sonically adventurous even while pausing to take stock. [Jan 2024, p.27]

He makes exultant use of his fellow musicians' capabilities to go out on a demented cultish high. [Jul 2025, p.36]

No doubt Arnstrom can craft an uplifting tune but his simpering tone ultimately suggests The Whitest Boy Alive being kicked in the face with sand. [Apr 2012, p.84]

Infinite House sounds like a less precious Dirty Projectors swagger toward that rare place where unashamed intellect meets accessible pop. [May 2015, p.69]

Goldie strikes a neat balance between exploratory drum programming ad sleek soul. [Jul 2017, p.30]

With I Can't Imagine, she's hit on the right combination of inspiration, kindred spirits and setting. [Jun 2015, p.78]

Guitar band goes synth' isn't going to stop any presses, but this new phase perfectly suits Editors well. [Nov 2009, p. 84]

Raw, wild, beautiful and sometimes painfully human, the results are enough to make the world a little easier to beat. [Sep 2020, p.29]

30 years on from "Chuck E.", it's a stunning testament to the vitality of her vagabond muse.

These make an effective pairing. [May 2012, p.72]

Mogwai are still exploring the push-pull dynamics of soft and harsh and slow and fast with almost bewilderingly pleasing results. [Oct 2017, p.35]

Bright, luscious and languid. [Apr 2005, p.102]

Through its adventuresome twists and well-considered combinations, this record acts a a necessary treat amid a turbulent and uncertain climate. [Feb 2021, p.22]

With Fox Confessor, she has defiantly come into her own. [Apr 2006, p.106]

Mind Hive follows a more varied set of strategies that yield both the dreamy haze of "Unrepentant" and the punishing grind of the eight-minute "Hung." [Feb 2020, p.35]

This is a dark and heartfelt affair. [Dec 2011, p.82]

Maximum Balloon isn't intended to carry the emotional and cultural weight of a TV On The Radio release, but it's a charming diversion that bodes well for Dear Science's follow-up, not to mention whichever artist is smart enough to hire Sitek as their producer next. [Sep 2010, p.98]

There's nothing mediocre here. [Jun 2020, p.34]

As if suddenly unleashed creatively, No Shape finds Hadreas building on Too Bright in every direction at once. ... The queer subtext of Hadreas' work is the source of much of its power. [Jun 2017, p.22]

However dry or highbrow it may sound on paper, Johannsson's melodious symphony of strings, electronics and choral elements is totally accessible and, for most of its 60-plus minutes, achingly lovely. [Jan 2008, p.101]

The welcome brevity of most tracks gives Snaith even more room to vary tempos and textures. [Nov 2022, p.28]

Marnia tones down the more extreme histrionics that made earlier albums and acquired taste. [May 2013, p.78]

The Spinning Top, a really very enjoyable record, displays some of the finest aspects of the guitarist’s talents, but chief among them, those that pertain to Coxon the folkie, and acoustic guitar stylist.

The results are extraordinary. [May 2013, p.76]

The band continues to elevate themselves into one of the country's finest pop exports. [Jan 2023, p.23]

There are many wise, deceptively simple insights on this wonderful album. [Jun 2015, p.82]

The seariung guitars, walloping drums and emphatic double-tracked vocals have determined power and character. [Mar 2010, p.81]

As the music spreads, and the sound engrosses and uplifts you, the tacit message feels humble and lightly worn: one of consideration, empathy and collective strength. [Feb 2023, p.30]

This is much more than the usual retro-action.... DJ Shadow remains elusive to the end. [Jun 2002, p.127]

Undeniably the work of a modern underground pop maestro. [Apr 2002, p.113]

It's a tender manifesto of self-doubt, a shout fading into a murmur. [Jan 2018, p.16]

Studio 68! return with full-throated Devonian Dani Turner adding a soulful garage twist. [Mar 2026, p.37]

The result is consistently thrilling and uncompromising music. [Aug 2023, p.28]

A bit Mariah Carey on paper, but startling in practice. [Dec 2012, p.77]

These articulate odes to pop's past strike the right balance between carefully studied craft and melodic inspiration. [Mar 2007, p.83]

The Mix-Up is the best record collection ever thoroughly digested and re-imagined by a bunch of guys in love with sound.

Dig deeper, though, and what we have here is a record more in line with the excellent, vengeful Americana of frontman Michael Gira's latter-day Angels Of Light fare. [Oct 2010, p.106]

Heavy Love is a supremely self-confident record. [Mar 2015, p.85]

Probably the closest anyone has come to capturing the 40-year-old virgin spirit of the seminal Modern Lovers album. [Mar 2015, p.84]

Analogue synths and electronic drums combine with distorted tribal chants to darkly compelling effect. [Apr 2014, P.77]