Crucially, though, sardonically strong melodies underpin the, er, shit. [Jun 2011, p.94]

Helplessness Blues is as passionately desolate as anything on Closer, the record which documented Ian Curtis' romantic guilt and existential confusion. [Jun 2011, p.74]

There's little on Heaven And Earth to truly trouble his best work, but throughout there's plentiful evidence of the many qualities which made Martyn so indefinable and influential. [Jun 2011, p.84]

The visionary meditations of John Tavener are a touchstone, and though used sparingly in the film's final cut, this dark, unsettling music stands proudly on its own. [May 2011, p.87]

This agreeable sequel boasts a more coherent country-folk sound, ironing out some of its predecessor's quirky, hand-knitted allure. [May 2011, p.77]

After the intermission of Aerial, could this mark the real beginning of the second act of Kate Bush's brilliant career? Let's hope, like Molly, the answer is "Yes..." [Jun 2011, p.81]

Demolished thoughts is his strongest solo collection to date. [Jun 2011, p.91]

This is the sound of a valuable, extravagantly vital band in full swing. [Jun 2011, p.91]

It's worth getting lost in their groove. [Jun 2011, p.93]

Gimme Some's relentless melodicism arrives with a harder edge than the dreamy naivete that powered "Young Folks," but the results frequently feel just as fine. [Jun 2011, p.93]

This complacent record from long-time drone lover and former Lungfish guitarist Asa Osborne gets the recipe badly wrong. [Jun 2011, p.103]

It's less wacky than their first--if still faintly smart-alecky--and boasts a clutch of impressively efficient, synth-powered indie pop numbers. [Jun 2011, p.103]

Elsewhere the good time roll with tuneful consistency as singer Cameron Omori arranges his affairs of the heart into three-minute teen-dreams called "Dance Away" and "Fallen In Love." [Jun 2011, p.96]

Here, they tinker with the formula slightly, shedding the surf drums, and adding washes of synth (usually a mistake, and so it proves). [Jun 2011, p.94]

The sheer abundance of ideas starts to wear the listener down a little ma few more slow-burners like "Bad News, Strange Luck" wouldn't go a miss. [Jun 2011, p.94]

An immersive blend of the symphonic and electronic, this absorbing album taps into a noble lineage stretching from AR Kane's lysergic avant-pop to sci-fi jazz alchemist Flying Lotus. [Jun 2011, p.94]

It is gleeful and vigorous, full of echoes, pan pipes, samples and shimmering surf guitars. [Jun 2011, p.94]

Fresh from his role as bandleader/producer on Robert Plant's Band Of Joy, Miller has corralled fellow guitarists Bill Frisell, Marc Ribot and Greg Leisz for this fine ensemble project. [Jun 2011, p.92]

You don't need a working knowledge of baseball to appreciate this second installment of true-life sporting tales from Steve Wynn, Peter Buck, Scott McCaughey and Linda Pitmon. [Jun 2011, p.92]

Inventive, playful and utterly engrossing, Celebration, Florida has much to revel in. [Jun 2011, p.92]

It is not only Wild Beats' finest album to date, but one of the best you're likely to hear all year. [Jun 2011, p.90]

Like Ill Communication, it's a superbly paced album, its felicitous stylistic juxtapositions the product of judicious cut-and-paste. [Jun 2011, p.89]

It's an album inspired by Camus that's never less than intense. It;s also overwrought, as the taciturn voice and glum lyrics wrestle for space with manically busy strings and an unfortunate folk feel. [Jun 2011, p.87]

Four vocal tracks serve to make the LP more than a masterclass in groove-ology. [Jun 2011, p.87]

Let Them Talk is competent and heartfelt but far from necessary. [Jun 2011, p.87]

Black Sun is subdued and ruminative: snaking around dancehall, grime, hip hop, but holding fast to its own uniqueness. [Jun 2011, p.87]

It's solid stuff. But he's got a way to go to rise above his influences. [Jun 2011, p.86]

Too many songs like "Spiral" lapse into mere pleasantness, but the clockwork body music of tracks like "Middle" and "Lady Luck" is compelling. [Jun 2011, p.86]

Sincere but Hokey homilies test the patience, but she brings imaginative vocal skills and real life experiences to "White Room," which displays a certain determined character. [Jun 2011, p.86]

They rise to each other's challenges surprisingly well, with sinuous lo-fi beats brushing against saxes, woodwinds and vintage synths. [Jun 2011, p.96]

Unquestionably, it is beautifully done. [Jun 2011, p.80]

Somewhat Gothic, but for all its dark corners, this debut gleams with a pop lustre. [Jun 2011, p.77]

Jaar, the son of conceptual artist Alfredo Jaar, can weave a heady spell, presenting himself somewhere between David Byrne and Ricardo Villalobos. [Jun 2011, p.85]

Inspired by the memory of departed friends, it sits midway between Cave's grand guignol, and the sweet hurt of Robert Forster. [Jun 2011, p.85]

The snarling Creedence-style rock is typical, but Golightly also does beautifully as a balladeer on "River Of Tears." [Jun 2011, p.85]

Eye Contact works because its bolshie drum patterns and metallic synth stabs, influenced by Jamaican dancehall and UK bass music, anchor it firmly in the near future, while Lizzie Bougastsos' strong and inventive melodies help make light work of what could come across like a pretentious muddle. [Jun 2011, p.85]

It's largely composed of pretty humdrum strum and twang, defining The Feelies less as the missing link between The Modern Lovers and Vampire Weekend, more as the founders of '80s college rock ordinaire. [Jun 2011, p.82]

They have come remarkably close to achieving the contoured crispness and in-your-face immediacy of their greatest achievement. [Jun 2011, p.79]

This still-teenage quartet writes heady songs that luxuriate in bubbling electronics, lagoon-diving reverb and layered harmonies. [Jun 2011, p.79]

The noise they make is thrilling. [Jun 2011, p.78]

Sickly aspiring novelist turned singer-songwriter Mikel Jollett can knock out a powerful anthem, but his relentless yearning choruses and chiming guitar harmonies ring rather hollow as signifiers of emotion. [Jun 2011, p.77]

Raw in texture but ambitious in scope. [May 2011, p.86]

This follow-up is chillier though no less stately, informed as it is by the recent death of her father. [May 2011, p.96]

It's hard to imagine a less workable hybrid than antifolk and disco pop--respect to Deez, then, for not simply avoiding disaster but also making music of a dangerously infectious nature. [May 201, p.86]

Black Noise was the most seductive techno album of last year, and it probably deserves better than this somewhat perfunctory remix comp. [May 2011, p.93]

The stand-out, though, is the epic "The Little Death (In Five Parts)" which mixes AC/DC pyrotechnics with a sexually charged rhythm section. [May 2011, p.80]

It is, at 78 tracks, quite a meal. But fine work lies within. [May 2011, p.96]

Throughout, his instrument is recorded so close, it practically lassos your ear with its strings. [May 2011, p.94]

On songs like "Ring Of Gold," the Llamas essay a beautifully melancholic take on sunshine pop that's pure and true. [May 2011, p.88]

There's ambition and wit here, and fans of alt.country Texas veterans like The Gourds and Old 97s will find much to admire. [May 2011, p.87]

Caught between Genesis and Crowded House, Guillemots end up careening between Melancholy, bombast and bad verse. [May 2011, p.87]

It would be silly to expect surprises from the Fairports at this late point, and their first album in four years proves as well tended and predictable as a Cotswold village. [May 2011, p.85]

Unfortunately it ends up as the kind of glossily produced "perfect pop" you can spin a dozen times without ever remembering a single tune. [May 2011, p.77]

Cat's Eyes has nice moment's has nice moments, but it makes you realize how much we'll miss Broadcast, who explored similar terrain with more aplomb. [May 2011, p.86]

This largely instrumental album is lush and joyful, roaming and sweeping across the ivories, one to which you can create a dramatic narrative of your own. [May 2011, p.79]

Folk-rock masterpiece of quietly influential Northern miserabilism. [May 2011, p.80]

A Thousand Mazes almost transcends its influences. Almost. [May 2011, p.91]

If Metronomy appeared glib in the past, here you'll find musical and emotional depth. [May 2011, p.91]

Mazes proves that San Franciscan guitarist Ripley Johnson has not musically strayed too far from home. [May 2001, p.93]

Their third full-length radiates the stale resignation of a band whose moment has passed. [May 20111, p.93]

It continues where his 2006 solo debut, "My Secret Is My Silence" began, mining the seams of British folk with out descending into chunky-jumpered sentimentality. [May 2011, p.103]

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]