Joy is both surer and sillier than Hair. [Aug 2018, p.33]

The sonic ambition is admirable. [Aug 2018, p.28]

To be fair, there’s an element of You Never Were Much Of A Dancer that feels a little like an index of possibilities, as though Raymond’s setting out what she can do: future albums will, hopefully, be yet more coherent, more conceptually thoroughgoing. But for a first album, it also feels stunningly confident, in full possession of its art. Guitar soli is in very good hands here indeed.

"High Roller" and "Medina" are laidback and elegant, blessed with Wu's dazzling, twinkling keyboard runs. But "Broken Theme" adds a note of challenge. [Jun 2018, p.37]

This discreet sense of procession is very much in keeping with Staples' MO on Arrhythmia, be it via the loops and beats of "A New Real" or the hushed calm of the exquisite "Memories Of Love." [Aug 2018, p.35]

Ackamoor's vision of fusing free-jazz blowing, African tribal grooves and spiritual black-consciousness musings remains unwavering. [Jun 2018, p.23]

It's nuanced "noise" that packs a hefty emotional punch. [Aug 2018, p.24]

Throughout the record there's a thoughtful restraint tot he compositions, swerving back and forth between quiet euphoria and shell-shocked dystopia. [Aug 2018, p.30]

Lamp Lit Prose is another outstanding chapter in what is shaping up to be one of the great 21st-century musical odysseys. [Aug 2018, p.29]

Each track has been precision-tooled for playlist perfection but even here the sheer class of "Rendezvous" and "Karma" shine through. [Aug 2018, p.35]

Sculptor is the strongest and most assured record of their career. The songs dig deep emotionally--but critically their aesthetics are well-balanced, the voice and instruments perfectly calibrated. [Aug 2018, p.18]

[A] chilled collection both soothing and intoxicating. [Jul 2018, p.30]

Nervy and noisy, Sixth House ranks alongside their best albums. [Aug 2018, p.33]

Hardly Electronic comprises 14 impeccably jangling, harmonic pastiches of Bacharach, McCartney and Free Design, with only Sasha Bell's sardonic vocals striking a welcome sour note. [Aug 2018, p.27]

At the fluttering heart of this 10th album is the voice of Karen Peris. Her phrasing and tonal glides are as distinctive as those of Victoria Williams or Iris DeMent. [Aug 2018, p.28]

Their fourth album is a quietly audacious work, careful but not cautious, an expansive blend of woozy country, skewed folk and cracked torch songs. [Aug 2018, p.30]

The five instrumental tracks are luminescent master classes in intuitive ensemble playing, too, Lloyd's sax as lyrical as Williams' poetry and matched by the inventiveness of the Marvels. [Aug 2018, p.30]

Purring, pulsing and bathed in neon, this might actually be their essential release. [Aug 2018, p.35]

Everything here remains personal, but it is also a cooler proposition. There's a degree of studio craft and narrative control here that Davies has never bettered. [Aug 2018, p.22]

The African-influenced essence of the record carries it along with grace but ultimately this is about celebrating the potential of the riff as rhythm. [Aug 2018, p.28]

He stretches out into these songs, inhabiting them comfortably and casually, almost always finding a way to make the familiar sound fresh. [Aug 2018, p.32]

The ballads are typically wry and pretty, however, especially the Christopher Cross-alike "Crack The Case," through "Feed The Fire" might have benefited from more rigorous editing. [Aug 2018, p.26]

It feels like Albarn in transit, both physically and mentally. [Aug 2018, p.27]

What felt like daydream ideas in maturation then have been shaped into trly rounded songs now.[ Jul 2018, p.30]

His self-deprecating humour and goofball vocals leaven these dark songs about mortality, confusion and alienation, lending both levity and gravity to the staticky guitar riffs and soaring choruses. [Aug 2018, p.28]

There's a lot going on but Georgopoulos makes it all feel unhurried and effortless. [Aug 2018, p.24]

It's an album that takes pleasure in its capacity to quietly, seductively surprise. [Aug 2018, p.28]

This is the rare jazz record that feels equipped to venture outside the genre's familiar borders and engage with the wider world. [Jul 2018, p.29]

Their strongest and most coherent records. [Jul 2018, p.28]

Parish's songs, alternately folksy, swampy and lonesome, are sometimes fleeting, capturing moments in the ether and preserving them in amber. [Jul 2018, p.33]

Watson's snarky humour prevents anything from feeling too weighty. [Aug 2018, p.35]

There's still a mumblecore sulkiness to Jordan's delivery that drags some songs down, but on tracks like the fingerpicking marvel "Let's Find Out" and "Deep Sea," she finds a distinctive voice all her own. [Aug 2018, p.33]

Generally the result is kind of Stars In Their Eyes Amy Winehouse. [Aug 2018, p.33]

Each track comes shrouded in glitchy systems noise and Eno-esque ambient drones. The best moments maintain Howard's way with a melody. [Aug 2018, p.28]

Here is transcendent refuge from the storm. [Aug 2018, p.26]

Things get chewier with "Tax To Your Head," as the trip gets a little heavier--musically as well as lyrically--eventually leading to gorgeous love song "Waitin'" and the pensive "Sitting On The First Rock From The Sun." [Aug 2018, p.24]

That quest to explore her true colors is tenderly juxtaposed with some grand arrangements--woodwind, strings, marching drums--that bring to mind Minnie Riperton, Bond themes and '40s Disney movies. [Aug 2018, p.24]

It's not revolutionary, but there's not a duff track to be found. [Aug 2018, p.24]

Where once were "chat-up lines and stairwells" ("Take Me There"), beige luxury apartments now stand. [Jul 2018, p.24]

Lovely, languid melodies disguise bleak sentiments on Erin Rae's solo debut. [Jul 2018, p.34]

The invigorating Downey to Lubbock, a record that speaks to both a lifetime of shared experience and the music that inspired them in the first place. [Jul 2018, p.26]

This post-genre approach allows them to take cumbia, mambo, porro, carnival music and ceremonial song, and mash it together in unpredictable and deeply psychedelic ways. [May 2018, p.35]

The choices on Dock Of The Bay Sessions suggest an artist who was refining his songwriting, someone concentrating more on character development. [Jul 2018, p.38]

A lovingly rendered family portrait. [Jul 2018, p.37]

A set pf ripe and mature songs that reflect poetically upon insecurity, sacrifice, pride and hubris. [May 2018, p.27]

Arthur stacks his vocals throughout, while his arching guitars, concussive programmed drums and resounding handclaps interlock with Buck's springy rhythm beds. [Jul 2018, p.24]

It might be best to appreciate Call The Comet as a sublime soundtrack, possibly the most atmospheric, widescreen guitar album you'll hear all year. [Jul 2018, p.25]

A strange, rich and global journey in sound--lasting just 37 minutes, Bon Voyage begs to be put on again, each listen revealing more of the myriad ideas that make up its weird majesty. [Jul 2018, p.22]

[He] appears to relish the chance to have some fun and revist classic Dr Feelgood licks. [Jul 2018, p.30]

Exceeding his early promise, Vynehall has produced a richly original debut to rank alongside his musical heroes, from Gavin Bryars to My Bloody Valentine to Aphex Twin. [Jul 2018, p.37]

The results are funkier than anything Byrne or Eno might have imagined almost 40 years ago. [Jul 2018, p.30]

For chunks of the album there's an unshakable feeling of familiarity. [Jul 2018, p.27]

Ghostly, atmospheric, intense, Colt is an impressive, if somewhat remote, debut. [Jul 2018, p.37]

Ghostly, atmospheric, intense, Colt is an impressive, if somewhat remote, debut. [Jul 2018, p.37]

Feels like the moment where the pair's music pulls into focus. [Jul 2018, p.37]

It's entirely addictive--one fix and you're hooked. [Jul 2018, p.36]

[African Scream Contest's] successor is every bit as thrilling, extending its remit to cover the years from 1963-1980 and thus offering a more diverse range of cross-cultural fusion. [Jul 2018, p.49]

Highlights--there are many. ... Masterful. [Jul 2018, p.28]

It mines familiar-enough influences. ... There's a sonic freshness, though, abetted by wizardy analogue production tricks of Daptone head engineer Wayne Gordon. [Jul 2018, p.34]

Diawara's voice is a supple and enchanting instruments, and her accomplices (in particular kora player Sidiki Diabate) sublime. [Jul 2018, p.27]

His voice isn't built for such poignancy. This is a 74-year-old's dance record, not an elegy. [Jul 2018, p.27]

Inexorable forward movement is shadowed by existential dread. [Jul 2018, p.30]

No one seems to know quite how he does it, but Donovan keeps going, quietly, from strength to strength. [Jun 2018, p.27]

The conventional sound palette leads to a number of fragrant compositions, which will do Actress' cold, hard image no good at all. [Jul 2018, p.23]

There's an inherent creepiness in his frequently audacious work that makes it hard to connect with on an emotional level. [Jul 2018, p.33]

It's warm and weird, but suddenly no stranger than the world around it. [Jul 2018, p.32]

On paper this should be a mess; on record it's a thrillingly chaotic sonic voyage. [Jun 2018, p.27]

Rose said she wanted to make an album that reflects the oscillating extremes of her personality--Loner is that and much more. [Jul 2018, p.34]

Automator's cinematic drama provides a stirring backdrop for the Doctor's prolix self-celebration, the ribald "Polka Dots," sinister "Power Of The World" and woozy "Flying Waterbed." [Jul 2018, p.27]

The death of beloved bandmate Carey Lander in 2015 seems to have inspired the freshest, blithest song's [Tracyanne Campbell's] written. [Jul 2018, p.34]

While Prass's gossamer tone is still light and distinctive. The moods, textures and themes, however, have evolved. [Jul 2018, p.35]

Her mother had died, but she had also found love. Musically, she's equally diverse. Mostly, there is the voice, a swooping instrument that swirls and eddies beneath sparse folk rhythms. [Jul 2018, p.24]

This set borrows from those same Nebraska recording sessions [of 2017's Tomorrow Forever] with nary a weakling to show. Pounding rock'n'roll colludes with lethal hooks, while jangly guitars and soulful harmonies mesh with ethereal melodies. [Jul 2018, p.34]

Horse Feathers have found their way to a much richer, more confident sound, marrying Southern soul grooves and rough-hewn Americana to Paul Simon eloquence. [Jul 2018, p.28]

This hypnotic blend of R&B-pop, luminous chillwave and whacked-out funk has its own piquancy. [Jul 2018, p.37]

The frenzied, immersive and hard-charged psych the band has explored previously gives way to an album that is woozy, melodic and reflective. [Jul 2018, p.37]

Simultaneously stupid and very smart. [Jul 2018, p.30]

The musical backing is politer than the lyrics, but it can't altogether blunt the boldness of their discourse. [Jul 2018, p.30]

Despite flashes of intense beauty, the going is heavy. [Jul 2018, p.30]

Though the stadium-EDM elements of "Miracle" are an unwelcome addition and there's a slight clash between two brands of brooding, when Matt Berninger guests on "My Enemy," Chvrches excel at an electro-pop simulacrum that's actually more craftily structured than most of their favourite records of 1982. [Jul 2018, p.26]

With an empathetic band featuring strings, keys and pedal steel, Castle alternative;y pulls the songs into focus with her clear, honeyed voice and lets it drift free inside them. [Jul 2018, p.24]

As ever, Case finds room for expansive manoeuvres in the gap between her lusty, orthodox pop choruses and droll, deadpan voice. Still a singer-songwriter like no other. [Jul 2018, p.24]

When it's glorious, it really is glorious. [Jul 2018, p.18]

Modern Studies' Emily Scott, Rob St John and their cohorts once again supplement their brackish folk with tape loops, harmonium, a Mellotron and more to create songs both ancient and modern. [Jun 2018, p.30]

Like a long walk in the woods, it's richly and deeply transporting. [Jun 2018, p.35]

It's far more restrained, foreboding and ultimately effective. [Jun 2018, p.27]

The predominantly instrumental Hundred Of Days is a more expansive affair than 2016's At The Dam. [Jun 2018, p.30]

Haines' mean-spirited gifts abide, but Airfix cannot mend a broken spirit. [Jun 2018, p.28]

Like The Siren’s Song itself, it feels both ageless and beguiling, a classic record for this or any other time.

The bruising "Madder" betrays the influence of Scott Walker producer Peter Walsh, but there are flickers of respite, notably "The Bomb," which tethers its emotional unravelling to a lovely piano figure. [Jun 2018, p.24]

There's an appealing American cynicism lurking beneath their enchanting '60s doo-wop-indebted sound. [Jun 2018, p.30]

Magpies, for sure--but rather brilliant ones. [Jun 2018, p.30]

Nelson's voice has lost none of its wry warmth, his fretboard fingers little of their astonishing agility. And the songs here are terrific. [Jun 2018, p.33]

Sultry, compelling and ever so slightly spooked, Cosmic Wink flickers and flashes like a series of time-lapse landscape photographs, but the place it documents is the heart. [Jun 2018, p.36]

The album could sometimes benefit from a shift in pace from its often locked-in, mid-tempo state. [Jun 2018, p.35]

Deafman Glance picks up the thread he's laid down with the stronger songs on Golden Sings That Have Been Sung. [Jun 2018, p.34]

Despite ts sometimes laidback nature, Sparkle Hard also bristles with an energy that proves he's got a place in the present, and a new accessibility that compromises none of his eccentricities. [Jun 2018, p.18]

It's droll, evocative and occasionally moving. [Jun 2018, p.30]