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]

The listener who experiences this album as physically as it is delivered will be rewarded with calories burned, an endorphin rush to die for, and heavy sweating indeed. [Aug 2010, p.94]

21 haunting, electronic vignettes. [May 2020, p.35]

Flares dazzlingly on initial contact, but dims a little. [Jun 2004, p.92]

This is deluxe, bespoke, artisan electronica, only slightly marred by its high seriousness and lack of mischief. [Jul 2014, p.67]

The overwhelming sense is of a group needlessly hobbling themselves. [Jun 2006, p.110]

Wilner hits a few gorgeous highs. [Mar 2012, p.90]

A record that feels massive without tipping into bombast. [Nov 2006, p.106]

A genuine emotional affinity underpins the marriage between Lanegan's lupine growl and 12 melodramatic songs of masculine despair. [Oct 2013, p.70]

Tribute To 2 is a richer and more complex collection [than his previous cover releases]. [Jan 2018, p.20]

In terms of breath-snatching bravura, Worden shines very brightly indeed. [July 2008, p.105]

This album is overflowing with ideas that the band don't have the means--or, indeed, the patience--to explore fully. [Feb 2009, p.85]

If it sounds suspiciously of coffee table, it is. But the coffee is freshly grounded, and thr table an elegant modernist sculpture. [Nov 2008, p.119]

The religious theme intimated by the title ensures that there is more going on with each track than mere mindless dirge. [Nov 2009, p.99]

There are plenty of moments where everything clicks, with Sun Araw's dayglo-acid guitar skirling over motorik rhythms and hubble-bubble analogica. But these don't on their own justify its existence, alas. [Oct 2011, p.84]

Bastards sounds like a new Bjork album rather than a cursory add-on. [Jan 2013, p.71]

It's Wells' unorthodox vision that presides. [Jan 2016, p.81]

The result is quiet success. [Mar 2018, p.25]

Some good songs emerge--"Ego Central High" is a glammy gem that makes its repetitiveness a virtue--but otherwise this is heavy listening that too often edges towards stodge. [Dec 2019, p.29]

[Producer Dessner's] immersive production, including layered keyboards and twinkling harmonics, pairs perfectly with her elegant voice. [Sep 2020, 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]

It's all well-crafted, but the end result can often sound like a slightly disjointed compilation album. [Feb 2013, p.70]

A power-shower of dour. [Oct 2013, p.68]

Hardly revelatory, but compelling in its sustained vision. [Apr 2012, p.73]

It is difficult to argue, however, that the second batch of Pixies records have been as thick on quality. It’s a trend that The Night The Zombies Came does little to buck – though the spectacular surf-psychedelia of “Motoroller” could have made Bossanova, and the glorious thrash of “Oyster Beds” snuck onto Trompe Le Monde. [Dec 2024, p.37]

Neither embarrassing nor unenjoyable, then, but still an exercise bearing a cautionary sting. [Nov 2005, p.98]

[The] rather slight songs raise the suspicion you would get more out of listening to Clinic's record collection than the band themselves. [Oct 2012, p.68]

The prevalent mood is somewhat dour, and the loss of Steve Shelley blunts some of the dynamism in Disappears' dogged repetitions. [Nov 2013, p.69]

There's a strong senes of '76 punk to All in God Time, more precisely bands like the Damned and Dead Boys. [Mar 2020, p.27]

Among The leaves is entirely consistent with the rest of Kozelek's fine catalogue. [Aug 2012, p.63]

It's more of a halfway house, with both acts' distinctive styles diluted as they server up '90s breakbeats ("Kokiri", "Fleece") and light industrial spoken-word pieces ("Nowhere"). Only the jangly promise of "passerine" sung by Emma Acs, hunts at a newish direction. [Mar 2025, p.35]

[The] excellent follow-up [to its 2010 debut] finds John Kowalski and Rian Trench playing to their strengths with horizons newly broadened. [Jun 2013, p.79]

Half of these tracks are superfluous, but the other half are mixtape gold. [Sep 2010, p.108]

With Lanegan, Nick McCabe and Ani DeFranco along for the ride, Dulli's roiling, captivatingly haunted songs detonate with incandescent splendor. [Mar 2011, p.

Intelligent and addictive. [Nov 2003, p.110]

I Am The Last has a wind in its sails, though, thanks to Tibet's preacher vigour, and an extraordinary guestlist. [May 2014, p.71]

She embeds her anxious, self-flagellating lyrics in jaunty settings that dynamically replicate garage rock, girl-group pop and doo-wop. [Mar 2017, p.30]

A ramshackle, frequently over-the-top barrage of familiar rock tropes appropriated in the service of an unmitigated romp. [Apr 2015, p.72]

The efforts are inconsistent, though, and his affinity with the fun and doom of '50s R'n'R is mostly lost to the demands of commercial bombast. [Jun 2009, p.88]

A stew of attractive singalong folk pop that looks to evocative kitchen sink drama for lyrical inspiration. [Feb 2014, p.83]

On his third solo album, he's found a niche that suits him. [Jul 2016, p.81]

Infatuated by the noirish romance of European coldwave, the likes of "Portland U" and "Collene" cast Stewart as something of a bedroom modernist. [Jan 2017, p.22]

Watford's Stavely-Taylor sisters and New York's chamber music sextet effortlessly bridge the divide between their chosen genres. [Feb 2018, p.35]

They've expanded on their debut's Goat/Can homage, opting for a rawer sound that leans on funk-charged bass throbs and wildly oscillating synths. [Apr 2019, p.36]

Here they often come across as Hard-Fi playing the songs of The New York Dolls--infinitely more irritating. [Nov 2007, p.104]

The Brooklyn five-piece's second record resembles an ordinary collection of pebbles--unlike their early sea-washed gems. [Mar 2016, p.73]

A cover of Pink Floyd's 'Echoes' proves you typecast Qui at your peril. [Oct 2007, p.102]

The result is pure pleasure as Black takes the trademark Brewis sound and ramps up the funk on groove-driven art-pop gems. [May 2015, p.81]

Lydon remains a devout pop modernist. [Oct 2015, p.81]

Fohr's voice is the constant, but here's it's denuded, its strangely hollowed-out tone perfect for Jackie Lynn's dizzying theatrics. [Jul 2016, p.76]

Every song offers something different, which holds your attention. [Apr 2009, p.101]

Though his voice is as lugubrious as ever, there is more light and shade than before. [Sep 2006, p.95]

Her free rock trio is on thunderous form on these lithe and sinewy instruments, stirred up in a cauldron of sub-metal froth and white-hot jazz rock. [Jun 2013, p.76]

A largely enjoyable ramble through '90s and early '00s-era soul-jazz and brassy funk. [Aug 2017, p.32]

Draws intelligently on its sources, revealing itself as more than mere pastiche. [Nov 2004, p.108]

No museum piece, Urstan energizes the past. [May 2012, p.80]

If this is indeed Crow's last recording, as she's speculated, this cavalcade of hotwired connections is a splendid way to cap off her career. [Oct 2019, p.27]

1982 has some nostalgic moments. ... But there is forward motion too. [May 2023, p.25]

Revolution Radio, happily, shares more with the zestier (and earlier) likes of Nimrod. [Nov 2016, p.28]

On their second release for Thrill Jockey they sometimes clear space in the pummeling blizzard of delay, fuzz and reverb. [Apr 2012, p.88]

It may be no great leap forward, but on this showing Nelson can still produce graceful electronica with a rare poise and reserve. [Mar 2009, p.95]

The mood flickers between foreboding and playful; blues for modern times. [Jan 2012, p. 93]

The quality zigzags, but Doughty maintains an agreeably impish spirit. [Mar 2013, p.70]

Intriguing and hauntingly lovely, if almost totally one paced. [Sep 2013, p.72]

"Nights In The Lab" finds scientist Martin pining for a white-coated colleague, one of many tracks that would have fitted just as neatly into his famed '70s stand-up shows as it does a highfalutin hoedown at the Grand Ole Opry. [Nov 2017, p.32]

Wildly ambitious debut. [Jan 2018, p.26]

Williams, subtly shadowed by Anthony da Costa's harmonies, delivers elegantly inflective performances on these bittersweet. deeply affecting contemplations of love lost and regained. [Jun 2019, p.37]

Half Moon Light's much-needed manifesto of hopefulness comes with the addition of uplifting lyrics further designed to keep up our spirits on dark days. [Mar 2020, p.30]

This rock'n'roll album falls far short of Little Ricard's atomic excitement in a genre here showing its age, but 78-year-old Van sounds youthly eager, even sensual in between the hushed female harmonies and honky-tonk piano of "You Are My Sunshine". [Dec 2023, p.34]

The music adds majesty to the industrial primitivism which purports to be the output of the fictional band, Memorial Device, with Pastel ensuring period veracity by revisiting cassettes of his teenage jams. [Jul 2024, p.38]

Little Honey is a heartening and humble album, sufficiently smart and aware to be an expression of thanks for the journey as well as the destination.

The pair's [singer James Mercer and producer Greg Kurstin] pop instincts ultimately prevail over more esoteric ambitions. [Apr 2012, p.86]

Pleasantly discreet, resolutely unengaging. [Oct 2005, p.107]

These veteran North Carolinians invariably put out albums of spirit, vim and polished Americana, with songs that boast powerful melodies and gorgeous harmonies. [Oct 2010, p.89]

After years of striving, makes Augustines a band that now sound energised by palpable relief. [Apr 2014, p.69]

Vermont is a project now--but the outcome is similarly minimal and beatific, with each of its 12 tracks shaded with only the most essential detail. [Mar 2017, p.40]

Unabashedly emphatic songs that nod to Robyn (notably on skyscraping opener "Good Intentions"), Cyndi Lauper ("Every Ounce Of Me") and Kate Bush ("Appetite"), though the settings are largely those of a US mainstream, '90s grunge-pop band. They flatten the resonance of Hollingworth's lyrics. [Feb 2026, p.35]

Overall the record has the pleasantly hobbyish but inessential air of a gap year vanity project. [Jul 2007, p.103]

[A] LP of sophisticated soul songs built around her exquisite vocals. [Sep 2015, p.76]

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]

Their most accessible and melodic yet. [Dec 2018, p.25]

He couches this misery in beautiful arrangements, writing on the piano, orchestrating with strings, and pitching his ambition somewhere between Serge Gainsbourg and Todd Rundgren. [Feb 2010, p.90]

The closest Wilco parallel to this sunshine pop is probably the Summerteeth album. [Apr 2003, p.108]

It's hard to see how much satisfaction this laconic talent must gain from fiddling with a formula he perfected in 1987. [Nov 2002, p.114]

For better or worse, this is love songs for grown-ups. [Aug 2004, p.94]

His twittering creations... use hip hop as their base but defy all attempts at categorisation and recall artists as diverse as Keith Jarrett, DoseOne and Smog. [Jun 2003, p.104]

Luddites still unconvinced that digital technology is capable of emotional expression should make this their first stop on the road to enlightenment. [May 2004, p.103]

This is a bold howl for attention from the backwoods of folktronica. [Apr 2009, p.89]

Back to the future, but intoxicatingly so. [Sep 2015, p.78]

A lovely understated album. [Feb 2016, p.75]

You leave Load Blown feeling that Black Dice, unlike many of their kin, are actually genuine experimentalists--even if it's with the caveat that sometimes it all rather blows up in their face. [Nov 2007, p.96]

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]

Of course, Black Sabbath can't fully turn the clock back to the beginning--but they can still do a pretty good job of sounding like the beginning of the end. [Jul 2013, p.70]

[Trust] hit upon a nifty formula that veers between mid-80s Depeche Mode and fruity Eurodisco. [Jul 2012, p.84]

For all the fine furies collected on Handwritten, the most memorable moments are those on which The Gaslight Anthem shift to lower gears. [Aug 2012, p.66]

Slim Twig's louche theatricality will probably repel as many listeners as it attracts, but life is a cabaret, old chum. [Jan 2015, p.92]

Adapting the lushest textures from'90s alt.rock, grunge and shoegaze, most strikingly on "tractor Beam" and "Dead End", Jordan is ready to take the next step. [Apr 2026, p.36]

Global Fusion at its most accessible. [Aug 2012, p.67]