Besides the odd burst of surf guitar and filigree finger-picking, the basic musical parameters remain unchanged. [May 2011, p.85]

All very impressive, if hallow at its core. [May 2011, p.88]

She has fashioned a still eccentric but bracingly focused collection of songs that blend her acrobatic and soulful Afro-jazz vocals with a collage music that defies any attempts at categorization. [May 2011, p.96]

It moves somewhat uneasily through Celtic folk and rural string music. [May 2011, p.92]

Wit's end is so sparse and downbeat that it occasionally verges on the drab. [May 2011, p.91]

Beneath its appealing veneer this remains a work wracked with personal anguish and doubt, and any positive engagement with life is welcome in it--even if, from necessity, it has to come from someone else. [May 2011, p.84]

A mostly successful fusion of sonic and sartorial elegance. [May 2011, p.82]

Strictly for the committed. [May 2011, p.80]

It has a peculiar charm. [May 2011, p.77]

An album that bounces airly between teen pop sublime and the aging rebel ridiculous. [Apr 2011, p.95]

Sadly beyond these two standouts ["Perfect Stranger" and "Katy On A Mission"], Brien's album swiftly degenerates into faceless Top Shop dance-pop filler. [Apr 2011, p.75]

Now reissued and remastered, those principals are still sound: classic riffs and also more toothsome and unswinging structures, what ch are nice, especially when they stop. [Apr 2011, p.94]

This recording demonstrates what he was capable of out of his element: a skillful entertainer working the crowd, reaching into his trick bag and pulling out just what he needs to get the job done.

Edwyn Collins is the perfect producer to lend the jaunty jangles an edge of both darkness and charm. [May 2011, p.91]

It's no disrespect to Chesnutt to observer that his songs sound better sung by Margo Timmins--the same could be said about anyone. [Mar 2011, p.86]

Julie Budet's breathy vocals may be a little too Vanessa Paradis, but producers Jean Francois Perrier and Tanguy Destable keep the grooves shiny and the beats sweet. [May 2011, p.103]

There are crafted, uplifting songs, but also haunting, ambient undercurrents hinting at everything from Art Of Noise to The xx to Fever Ray. [May 2011, p.103]

Overall, however, the reaction is a resounding "Huh?" [May 2011, p.103]

Much of the rest, alas, suggests a gift not for clairvoyance but invisibility. [May 2011, p.94]

The execution falls vexingly short of ambition, principally because a little of Darnielle's limited voice goes a long way. But the best of the songs are great. [May 2011, p.93]

A discordant, but strangely beautiful, experiment from the outer fringes of pop. [May 2011, p.93]

Alas, it often sounds like hollow noise--but improves when he warms down. [May 2011, p.92]

Clever, costly videos prove the couple painfully hip, but close your eyes and it could be Mel & Kim. [May 2011, p.91]

Apocalypse is a wild thing which dances from one side of that line [between brilliant and bizarre] to the other with never-less-than-compelling abandon. [May 2011, p.89]

They produce strong enough tunes to make their act more than just a celebration of kitsch. [May 2011, p.88]

Curdled cuts of lover's R&B are oddly beguiling, but best are the dancier cuts like "Warlord," a blissful excursion in strobing percussion and luxurious, frothy synths. [May 2011, p.88]

It's a partially successful approach that starts promisingly with the disco trust of "Never Let Me go" and "Night People," but the plodding tempo begins to drag, and by "Single Minded" the listener feels worn out. [May 2011, p.88]

It's confounding at first, but the more you strain to hear, the more Krell reels you in. [May 2011, p.88]

It's one of the most straight-up enjoyable records they've put out in a long time. [May 2011, p.88]

It's a lovely document of Higgins' loose, rambling songs. [May 2011, p.88]

Alexander isn't far off great. [May 2011, p.86]

The real problem is the corporate production--the cleaner and slicker it gets, the flatter each song sounds. [May 2011, p.86]

Occasionally, though, the songs resemble fragments of poetry, signifying little more than unfocused emotions, with Diane undecided about whether to be pretty or strange. [May 2011, p.82]

This is departure lounge pop--antiseptic, pleasant, with Photoshopped pics of exotic locales scattered around, but none of the hedonism of actually being there. [May 2011, p.82]

Cherish The Light Years is more accomplished, refashioning vintage Mute Records sounds into widescreen pop. [May 2011, p.80]

The band must from time to time stray from their stomping ground of doomed sailors and pining maidens, but one hopes the band will not steer too close to plain old indie rock. [May 2011, p.96]

The King of Limbs passes like a breeze, and has you skipping back to the start as soon as the final track fades out. [May 2011, p.90]

It feels like an extended hymn to his home state. [May 2011, p.92]

Yes, Paper Airplanes is mindful of the past. But it's never held back by it. [May 2011, p.92]

Yet vocal gymnastics cannot compensate for an unmemorable set of tunes. [May 2011, p.91]

"Try To Sleep" and the Kool Keith quoting "Witches" are songs that join classics in their cannon. [May 2011, p.91]

What follows is the most overblown album in recent memory, every song instantly hitting the "big Music" button without giving the listener a chance to become acquainted. [May 2011, p.87]

It lacks many truly original hooks, but this is a nice updating of Count Five-style psych menace to file with fellow lo-fi '60s revivalists like King Khan and Dum Dum Girls. [May 2011, p.82]

The result is a record that demands to live not in some mythologised '80s, but in the here and now. [May 2011, p.81]

Nine Types Of Light suggest they're settling in nicely. [May 2011, p.78]

Their literate, grandly melancholic '80s-influenced rock rarely transcends familiar reference points, but Lou Hill is a passionate, distinctive vocalist. [Apr 2011, p.103]

Not radically reinventive, then, but Vessels deserve to keep their foothold on the post-rock face. [Apr 2011, p.100]

These are glistening sonic fancies picked out in neon and Day-Glo. [May 2011, p.79]

Five years on, New Orleans' Turk Dietrich and Michael Jones return with nine rather more conventionally structured songs than the nebulous, shapeshifting drones of their debut, Orange Language. [May 2011, p.79]

Despite the epic pretensions of the 16-miniute finale, "Tao Of The Dead Part Two,", sadly, this sort of tribute to rock's historical hinterlands yields fewer surprises each time. [May 2011, p.77]

As ever, Simon's work is a strange mix of easy and uneasy listening--it's balm, but it leaves an itch. [May 2011, p.74]

It fuses disparate cultures with such joyous irreverence that, for 40 inspirational minutes, entire notions of national borders and racial divides cease to exist. [Apr 2011, p.77]

Their true talent lies in creating songs replete with dreamy, late summer melancholy, shrouded in dusky reverb and topped off with Justin Young's oddly emotive quaver.[Apr 2011, p.84]

Baltimore multi-instrumental duo Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack have raised their game with this third LP. [Apr 2011, p.103]

The tunes can be slight, and sometimes their spirit of appropriation leaves them rather red-handed. [Apr 2011, p.91]

These are good songs, but they're so boldly signposted, you can see them miles away. [May 2011, p.85]

Despite their monotone and their monoxide fuming, it's hard not to warm to Monotonix, especially when they catch fire. [Apr 2011, p.86]

Nice work all round. [Apr 2011, p.86]

Her quirky homespun arrangements have been toughened and broadened, adding a knowingly retro girl-group stomp and echo-drenched Spector-ish grandeur to windswept heartbreak anthems. [Apr 2011, p.85]

Keren-Ann Zeidal has been covered by Jane Birkin and Francoise Hardy, but here progresses from chansons to create a spectacularly produced pop-art. [Apr 2011, p.85]

Too late for success, maybe, but identity crisis (narrowly) avoided. [Apr 2011, p.84]

You're unlikely to be disappointed. [Apr 2011, p.84]

His primary source is a pipe organ in an Icelandic church, which he processes, filters, deconsecrates, muddles and distorts, and therefore liberates in the course of this album, enabling its latent potential to escape from its wooden room and form a burgeoning cloudscape. [Apr 2011, p.83]

Their debut is an urgent affair full of scratchy, slyly melodic and occasionally anthemic post-punk rock. [Apr 2011, p.83]

Once the shock subsides, it's quite charming. [Apr 2011, p.89]

The real heart of this record seems to lie in moments of stillness and rest, where strung-out slackerdom attains an almost sacred quality. [Apr 2011, p.88]

The musicianship is slick enough, but if you thought their salt-of-the-earth fiddly folkie pose was a bit iffy, this is a whole new level of phoney. [Apr 2011, p.89]

Their no-frills shtick excites in small doses. [Apr 2011, p.89]

Sure, at times, they sound like Gene, but on tracks like "Do You Really Wanna Know" they are nigh-on perfect: Jangly and breathless, with traces of The Smiths but a softer edge. [Apr 2011, p.89]

The result is an album that bursts with life and invention. [Apr 2011, p.89]

Others paying respects are Steve Earle, Kid Rock and Lucinda Williams, though the inclusion of Lee Ann Womack and Faith Hill dilutes the overall impact. [Apr 2011, p.90]

It is guitarist Drew St Ivany who controls the ebb and flow, his use of scintillating, strobe-like textures and groaning chasms of feedback recalling Skullflower, or Comets On fire at their most intense. [Apr 2011, p.91]

Six Organs may be a stylistic cul de sac for Chasny but, on this evidence, who needs a way out? [Apr 2011, p.92]

If TDD's Cure obsession at times gets the better of them, their buoyancy and drive will still fill floors. [Apr 2011, p.95]

The View's handicap is the sheer lumpen ordinariness of their songwriting. [Apr 2011, p.100]

In short, it's a quietly beautiful record: anthemic but not bombastic, introspective yet universal, simply drawn but beautifully coloured in. [Apr 2011, p.82]

Producer Hal Wilner again helms this follow-up but the chemistry proves more fitful. [Apr 2011, p.80]

The band's one weakness lies in the voice of Orkney folk obsessive Erland Cooper, a thin, plain instrument that fails to engage. But the unpredictable, symphonic arrangements of "Emmeline" and the title track make exciting connections between ancient and modern with a dark nonchalance, [Apr 2011, p.80]

Eleventh Dream Day may be getting on, but there are no signs of them growing stale. [Apr 2011, p.80]

Perhaps they should have been more democratic in the past, because this is a terrific record that plays to The Strokes; Strengths and also adds fresh colour to their palette. [Apr 2011, p.79]

His seventh sees few stylistic changes. [Apr 2011, p.78]

The poacher has turned into a sophisticated gamekeeper, plotting a course on this fine debut between pulsing cosmic electronics and trippy, after-hours pop. [Apr 2011, p.78]

A joyfully inspired album from a band who give pomp a good name. [Apr 2011, p.78]

At 14 tracks, what begins as a demonstration of impressive ambition ends up dragging. [Apr 2011, p.78]

Smith's squeaky, adenoidal vocal, long a barrier to Danielson's popular acceptance, has softened somewhat, while the band are in fine form. [Apr 2011, p.78]

It's Cervenka's superb vocals that make this a carer highlight. [Apr 2011, p.77]

While not quite a handbrake turn, No witch shows a band moving out of the woods into wider spaces. [Apr 2011, p.77]

They've sorted through a kitbag of 80 songs and made good on the potential. [Apr 2011, p.77]

Collapse Into Now can only sound like an afterthought, but it nevertheless one which bristles and fizzes with invigorating qualities of wit and fury. [Apr 2011, p.76]

The sense of naive wonder evident recalls the bewitching power of Sigur Ros. [Apr 2011, p.75]

Her brush with the big boys only appears to have strengthen her resolve on a collection of fierce country rockers. [Apr 2011, p.75]

A dizzying positivity is the constant in this adventure in fractal sonics. [Apr 2011, p.75]

Several tunes put the talents of Bradford-based Hladowski siblings Chris and Stephanie to stunning effect on vocals and amplified bouzouki respectively. [Apr 2011, p.75]

Josh Pearson has gone there so we don't have to--we should be grateful he's returned to tell the tale. [Apr 2011, p.72]

The Leeds-based electro-rock five-piece set their sights shamelessly high on this grandiose second LP, a novelistic collection of characters journeying through a lavish panorama of cinematic sounds. [Mar 2011, p.101]

The Luyas concentrate on sounding endearing rather than epic. [Mar 2011, p.94]

More often than not, Ben appears to be channeling his hero JJ Cale, although the spirited title track doffs a beret in the direction of Richard Thompson. [Mar 2011, p.97]

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