Like 2010's The Shine and 2013's Hoodoo, Rain Crow is thick with nervous trepidation, ominous trips into the rural mindset. [Jul 2016, p.82]

Simple Songs is a major statement from a brilliant, mischievous singer-songwriter. [Jul 2015, p.80]

Theirs is a maniacal mish-mash of seemingly incompatible musical styles--Krautrock, psychedelia, no-wave, prog, synth-pop, '70s stoner rock and punk--wrought from a deeply felt, genre-leaping love of challenge. [Feb 2004, p.80]

Warm, fuzzy and delicious. [May 2023, p.31]

It represents Lauderdale travelling full circle, coming 30 years after his first recordings with bluegrass legend Roland white, but with a few of the flourishes he brought to Elvis Costello's recent touring outfit The Sugarcanes. [Oct 2011, p.91]

Charmingly wistful and twitchily rhythmic pop songs. [Nov 2015, p.71]

By turns darker and more challenging than 2003's dazzling Electric Version. [Oct 2005, p.96]

The band's blend of psychedelia and angular guitar menace is invigorating. [Jan 2006, p.112]

His verse is relentlessly positivistic and hippy-ish (“I go forward in the courage of my love”), delivered in a conspiratorial whisper, but the highlight is the backing, which drifts between spiritual jazz, skeletal dub and folksy minimalism, all the time featuring Fairbairn’s quiet, quavering tenor sax improvisations. [May 2022, p.26]

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]

It's a typical cyclical riff and chant but, unlike other Tuareg bands, driven by full drums. Elsewhere, the quieter "Achaka Achail Aynaian Daghchilan" comes complete with subtle blues flourishes. [Nov 2013, p.79]

Packing 14 tracks into 38 minutes, it's very much a sprint, the breathlessness part of its impact, despite this intensity, mainman Jack McEwan steers SHYGA!... clear of excess and keeps his ear on melody throughout. [Apr 2021, p.34]

If art is love, and love is art, then this hyper-stylised, characteristically idiosyncratic break-up album, in the end makes a perfect kind of sense. [Mar 2017, p.36]

This is a generous, curious and commendably weird LP. [Jul 2022, p.26]

Delicately arranged, and sympathetically drenched in reverb by producer Jason Quever, its six tracks find him in typically hushed mood. [Feb 2014, p.83]

Voice and piano are to the fore, but Wasser's orchestrations pulse and ebb like living things. [July 2008, p.102]

A lucid and accomplished departure. [Mar 2015, p.76]

Ten dark and lovely reasons why love hurts. [Apr 2015, p.84]

Marling's fifth takes vast steps forward musically, as ever. It's more defiant and distinct than anything she's done before. [Apr 2015, p.74]

Niño’s adventurous, meditative spirit is a worthwhile companion for Ntuli’s masterful piano and expressive voice, resulting in an album that is vivid and subdued in equal measure, the vitality of a battle cry rendered as a warm embrace. [Jan 2024, 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]

An uncommonly thoughtful victory lap, which deserves--and has received--a handsome recorded memorial.

It's genuinely smart, intriguingly playful set that both presses all the right Big Pop buttons and sounds decidedly off-centre. [Jul 2017, p.36]

Bold and Breathtaking [Jul 2025, p.26]

The results are as charming as they are accessible. [Feb 2003, p.86]

Audacious and urgent. [Jun 2013, p.74]

There's a strangely disarming quality to Rose Windows' second album. [Jun 2015, p.80]

Send is pure gristle, a vicious statement of musical intent. [Jul 2003, p.129]