It's at times crushingly heavy, but there's a cerebral knottiness to the arrangements, and Chino Moreno's vocal boasts a windswept melancholy harking back to the new romantics. [Dec 2020, p.29]

Their creative freedom is evident again on their final album. [Aug 2024, p.30]

Their most imaginative and immersive album yet, with Webber emerging as a more commanding frontwoman. [Nov 2019, p.28]

Once Twice Melody's greatness lies not in its hugeness - it's in the duo's ability to create music that possesses the same intimacy regardless of its scope. [Mar 2022, p.33]

Quiet Life enabled Japan to get from B to C, and from D to E, and from there to wherever they went next. ... A third disc, recorded live at Japan's Budokan, captures the band at full tilt. [Apr 2021, p.45]

The listlessness of the structures is initially offputting, but the tracks begin to reveal luxurious depths. [Dec 2013, p.69]

A bold leap forwards. [Apr 2008, p.98]

Alongside warm, grunge-pop songs sit the reverb-and-ambient-noise bath that is "Night Swimming," the tripped-out psych folk of "Lucy" and hugely poignant epic" Yellow Is The Color Of Her Eyes." [Apr 2020, p.35]

His mystical belief in the power of love pervades the material, sometimes anthemically, sometimes playfully, but always disarmingly. [Oct 2007, p.96]

Wildly ambitious in its melding of industrial bombast, free-jazz skronk, horror-film atmospherics and psych freakouts. [Mar 2019, p.34]

Here she uses soft synths to emulate an organ, lute and pipes, which combine on the likes of “Vanity” and “Qasmuna (Dreaming)” to cast an alluring spell, evoking the likes of vintage Boards Of Canada and Catarina Barbieri’s superb Ecstatic Computation. [Jul 2021, p.21]

In which the prince of hip hop get a blessing from the king. [Sep 2008, p.110]

Smith habitually flows everything together, creating glowing and serene canvases of sound with her own gentle and expressive voice hymning at the centre. [Jul 2020, p.34]

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

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]

Tracyanne Campbell still writes exquisite songs that don’t sacrifice melancholy for cleverness, and the band still provide smart arrangements that nod to country, Motown, Brill Building pop and other distinctly American sounds. [May 2024, p.32]

His ninth album rests on his strengths. His balladeer’s voice is a steadying comfort on “Heavy Rain”, adding subtle Orbison shivers on “I’ll Never Get Over You”. Duane Eddy-like twangs judder through murder ballad “Two For His Heels”, and a guitar solo scorches “Deep Space”. The album’s beating heart, though, is “People”, a supernal acoustic tribute to Sheffield. [Jun 2024, p.33]

Donovan's songs are still queerly wired, taking unexpected detours, blasting out into destructo-guitar solos, stomping T. Rex blues, and drenching acoustic guitar in slapback echo and ghostly vox. [Aug 2015, p.77]

A bold and vibrant tableau of pulsing beats over which Hamdan's serpentine voice coils and caresses. [Oct 2025, p.28]

Gently irresistible throughout. [Aug 2024, p.31]

The band's trademark cracked songcraft... is here in spades. [Nov 2004, p.99]

It's the darker numbers in which Jewel's muse gleams brightest. [Sep 2013, p.95]

Though not as viscerally crushing as A Crow Looked At Me, Lost Wisdom Pt 2 is as plainly poetic. [Jan 2020, p.27]

A beguiling mix made more loveable by its melancholic core. [Aug 2006, p.100]

A friskier beast than usual. [Jan 2018, p.29]

A hugely enjoyable, idiosyncratic ride. [Sep 2023, p.37]

Tourist In This Town fairly fizzes with the excitement of striking out alone, and justified confidence that hers is a voice worth hearing. [Mar 2017, p.26]

Love Yes is a dazzling electronic set that throbs with energy and emits a sensual glow befitting its focus on love, desire and sexuality. [Mar 2016, p.81]