It's a great combustible mix, a whirlwind of new sounds caught by the tail, diced and dissected and in permanent hectic propulsion. [Sep 2011, p.91]

It's a colourful, cartoonish world they inhabit, but its trippy qualities are packed with ambitious detail and worthy of serious attention. [Sep 2013, p.94]

Frivolous fun, if that's allowed. [Oct 2012, p.86]

An obsessively dark record. [Oct 2012, p.79]

Arbouretum have often looked from a distance kike a vehicle for their frontman. Ostensibly Dave Heumann's first solo album, Her In the Deep more or less confirms as much. [Nov 2015, p.77]

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

Stylish and substantial, it's a deft masterpastiche that dissolves history for its own entertainment. [Oct 2006, p.114]

The results are as striking and challenging as you'd expect. [May 2026, p.35]

The Endless Not sees the whirring tape-loopsof old replaced by iMacs, but not at the expense of sheer abrasiveness. [May 2007, p.113]

It turns out that this consistently astonishing writer chronicles happiness as astutely as he evokes its opposite. [Sep 2010, p.92]

It is still familiar as an Interpol album, but it's certainly their most refined, elegant and frightening release. [Oct 2010, p.97]

There is nevertheless a supreme revitalisation of her deep-seated powers evident here. [Oct 2007, p.96]

As the music heads dynamically towards its conclusion, you feel as if you are in safe hands, a life raft on a wave of crushing power. [Apr 2020, p.18]

Ferraro pulls off the trick of sounding cheap and luxurious all at once. [Feb 2013, p.73]

It's a work of elegant simplicity--a suite of wistful and slightly breathless songs set to dreamy tropical guitar and muted lo-fi beats. [May 2019, p.23]

The likes of "No Sun To Burn" (for brass) or the nine0minute title track, will pull on the listener's heartstrings at least as much as it endorses the composer's process. [Feb 2024, p.31]

Freed from Torquil Campbell's mannered indie melodrama, she gives full rein to her inner country girl. [Jan 2010, p. 121]

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

The overall effect is both dark and playful. [May 2014, p.74]

Fall[s] somewhere between Talk Talk and the Bunnymen. [Sep 2004, p.98]

Thomas lurches from surrealist poetry to impressionistic short stories, like a hybrid of Captain Beefheart and Ernest Hemingway. [Jul 2019, p.33]

Wells adds waves of beauty, and flurries of click-track neurosis to Moffat's dispatches from the fringes of self-disgust. [Jun 2011, p.91]

The band achieve an impressive impact with a wide dynamic range. [Jun 2003, p.109]

This terrific album casts its net wider though: as well as Dinosaur fans, this will appeal to admirers of T. Rex, Thin Lizzy, Reigning Sound ad Alex Chilton, too. [May 2010, p.108]

The Trackless Woods is one of those wonderful records that reveals more if itself with each successive play. [Sep 2015, p.74]

Calling this Wells' pop album does a disservice to its cheerfully experimental tone. [Aug 2014, p.76]

With the band showing no loss of force or focus, the latest is another essential if discomfiting listen. [Nov 2024, p.36]

The likes of “D&T”, “Alice” and the cheekily titled “A Gaslight Anthem” are destined to inspire sessions of air-punching by anyone who still believes a life might be saved by three chords, the truth and a glass of the good stuff. [Nov 2024, p.37]

Toth's chimeric qualities are still evident. [Oct 2008, p.113]

Saved! is powered by a sense of joyful rebirth. [Review of the Year 2023, p.29]

Their tenth LP OH (ohio) lands with some nervous expectation attached. As it turns out, it’s their best record since 2000 landmark, "Nixon."

Ramshackle, out of tune, fey and frail, not yet tightened by Trevor Horn, these tracks capture the essence of this band's particular genius. [Dec 2008, p.83]

Damned meets JAMC with a snifter of So-Cal pyscho-country-surf--on a series of hip, heady, lo-fi tunes, a large number of which seems to have the word "goth" in the title. [Aug 2009, p.95]

The songs are more direct and arrive with a harder edge [than 2012's Blood Speaks]. [May 2014, p.80]

If there's a tiny problem, it's that such sonic weirdness detracts a little from Del's entertaining rhymes. [Jun 2011, p.80]

While Baby I'm Bored is way too modest to be a masterpiece, it's far more than a join-the-dots account of a life on the rocks, and grows brighter, and more optimistic, with every play. [Apr 2003, p.102]

Resounds with the liberated feeling of an artist who not only has something to say but an audience to say it to. [May 2024, p.35]

Everything Everything continue on their quest to make intricate yet seamless electronic art pop. [Sep 2020, p.29]

At her best, and across much of Banga, Patti Smith still dramatises the distance between South Jersey and the San Francisco basilica, the street tussle between the poet and the factory girl, the devotion of the mongrels of faith for the betrayers of salvation. [Jul 2012, p.78]

His gruff grumble suits the narrator’s weary stoicism, and not for the last time on this album, those gnarled fingers wring flamenco flavoured miracles from the fretboard of that battered, antique Martin. [Jun 2024, p.28]

"Remembering" and "In Your Hands" are full of gorgeous, African-influenced harmonies. In fact, Mulvey's arrangements are generally more ambitious. [Oct 2017, p.35]

A deftly underplayed album. [Sep 2011, p.87]

They exhale the kind of swirling 'perfect pop' that was the default setting of late '80s Creation releases, leaning into the crosswinds of Fairport-era folk-rock. [May 2005, p.100]

In short, dense, mesmerising, involving. [Oct 2013, p.63]

Sigur Ros' alien beauty prescribes its own definition. [Oct 2005, p.112]

It’s her voice, always expressive and active, that anchors even the wildest experiments, whether it’s the children’s choir at the end of the title track or the ratatat rhythms of “Obligation”. [Apr 202, p.32]

Presented largely stripped of 1967 production values – acoustic folk with a bit of reverb – but still sound innately lysergic. [Sep 2024, p.33]

All expertly tied together by Tuttle's rare gift for nuance and colour. [Aug 2023, p.28]

Laudably, unfussy. [Feb 2020, p.35]

Hanson has imbued this LP with a thematic and musical cohesiveness that makes it the finest record of his career to date.

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

Rowdy, vivid, moving and playful, The Felice Brothers is just glorious.

Captivatingly widescreen stuff. [May 2025, p.27]

This very fine third album carries much of Okkervil River or The Decemberists in its piquant narratives, though the banjo-led music is more akin to the erudite hillbilly-folk of Jim White or even The Be Good Tanyas. [Apr 2013, p.73]

The bristling performances more closely resemble the solo piano excursions of such post-bop masters as Chick Corea and Keith Jarrett, which s no bad thing at all. [Aug 2020, p.33]

This is a satisfying strange listen. [Jul 2016, p.75]

Art Brut's fourth album marries attractively sloppy garage-rock riffing to boozy bad-sex confessionals and bittersweet self-examination. [Jun 2011, p.77]

The rest of Tripper rises to the challenge with nonchalant ease. [Sep 2011, p.87]

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

Supremely satisfying comeback album. [Jul 2023, p.36]

A finely crafted mood piece rewarding deep immersion. [Dec 2017,p.25]

This is a terrific, sustained album. [Aug 2006, p.93]

Entirely irresistible. [Aug 2023, p.33]

More surprising, perhaps, is the gorgeous, toe-tapping soul-pop of “Step Into Your Power”, which brings to mind Matthew E White and may just be the best song Lamontagne has written since 2004’s “Trouble”. [Sep 2024, p.36]

Rose channels longing and romantic despair via expansive songs that owe much to the feel of classic country from the '60s and '70s. [Apr 2021, p.26]

At first, Fade sounds like more of the same--which is no bad thing. Stick with it, and the influence of producer (Tortoise') John McEntire becomes apparent. [Feb 2013, p.81]

These Varsailles dwellers make records that initially seem like delicately generic powerpop, but gradually emerge as vivid, bittersweet epiphanies. [Jun 2009, p.99]

A cohesive, strong statement as well as an exciting one. [Dec 2022, p.30]

To be filed alongside the Root's recent Phrenology. [Mar 2003, p.95]

This wildly varied collection begins with their first release in 2002, "No Pasaran" about the Spanish Civil War, and include treats such as "Dream Come True," a self-released 7" given away at gigs, which sounds like Henry Rollins singing the "Grease "soundtrack while vomiting marbles. Yes, it's that good. [Feb 2010, p.84]

This is a bleakly beautiful record which unfolds slowly. [Apr 2011, p.87]

Smith's heartfelt songs take on a more melancholic hue. [Jul 2012, p.70]

It's beautifully eerie. [Oct 2018, p.30]

It includes great music, but it still has that hairy, unpredictable, somewhat demented aspect that gives the Blues Explosion its unique spark. [Oct 2012, p.72]

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

The most immediately striking thing is the effect of the string arrangements, which add an extra layer of haunting mystery. [Oct 2006, p.102]

He still produces beautiful albums of impeccable tone and fine songs. [Dec 2011, p.96]

Imagine Bolan produced by Prince, then scrambled by Beck, and you're only halfway there. [Mar 2007, p.85]

The No. 1 slot will continue to elude him, but a strange, dank pop corner remains his and his alone. [Mar 2018, p.26]

Its cavernous production, Massed campfire guitars and rolling melodies conjure prairies, river and mountains from shore to shining shore. [Feb 2013, p.75]

Ayewa always makes ambitious albums, but Jazz Codes feels like her richest yet, her Lemonade, her To Pimp A Butterfly. [Sep 2022, p.28]

Eleanor Friedberger is rejuvenated on fourth solo album Rebound. [Jun 2018, p.27]

Swift's stock-in-trade remains droll, gently roistering piano songs, mostly indebted to Harry Nilsson. [May 2009, p.97]

This full-bodied, all-star immersion into an insalubrious world inspired by late '70s/early-'80s continental disco is somehow more appealing than Matmos' recent foray into Polish mid-century avant-garde. [Dec 2022, p.35]

It’s bonkers--hilarious, maddening, ridiculous and slightly shit--yet never dull.

The animal kingdom looms large but human experience is still at the core of Rennie's surreal couplets, given added portent by Brett's compellingly mournful baritone. [Jun 2013, p.73]

Lovely, life-affirming stuff. [Apr 2010, p.97]

"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]

An album that takes nothing for granted, that doesn't consider your attention a gift, that wants to impart something profound to you. Trust her. [Sep 2019, p.28]

He hasn't sounded this corrosive since Copperhead Road. [Nov 2002, p.115]

From the stripped-back acoustic touches on “This Will Go On” to the distorted vocals and gritty overdrive guitars of “Leaving Umbrella”, it’s a pleasing yet ever-shifting journey to be taken on. [Jul 2024, p.35]

Odd--and oddly impressive. [Jul 2014, p.81]

Gathering is another collection of Dylanesque strummings, rescued as always from generic blandness by Ritter's alacrity as a lyricist and husky grin of a voice. [Nov 2017, p.36]

Each of these three artists brings out something new in the others, prodding them slightly out of their comfort zones. [Jan 2021, p.16]

A fascinating accompaniment to Hollander's book of the same name. ... Superb collection. [Dec 2018, p.46]

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

They're the true inheritors of the psychic disconnect and crude abstraction that marks out those early Royal Trux albums: less Stones, more stoned. [Jan 2014, p.75]

It's clever, surprisingly enjoyable and utterly insane. [Apr 2025, p.39]