A triptych of gauzy electro-country duests show what they can do when they shake off some of their self-conscious wackiness. [Dec 2008, p.92]

As poetry alone, it's interesting, but the music's elegance make it something more. [Jan 2011, p.93]

Their one great idea grows tiresome over an album's length. [Oct 2010, p.88]

There's some shrewd commercial nous behind their retro-wackiness. [Aug 2008, p.85]

Majestic, life-affirming and touched by magic. [Nov 2004, p.102]

This is fizzy, superficial pop by a band convinced they're making classic rock. [Dec 2005, p.114]

The arrangements... are ambitious and richly textured, producing work that rewards repeated listening. [Jan 2003, p.117]

It's saved from twee tedium by Campbell's sumptuous orchestrartions and sly wit. [Dec 2003, p.115]

Fly Or Die has more in common with 10cc and XTC than it does Common.... Prog-pop album of the year. [Jun 2004, p.91]

Arid and mannered. [Nov 2003, p.112]

It all adds up to an album that is pleasantly quirky rather than revealing. [Jan 2014, p.71]

Kate St. John's arrangements are suitably elegant, but most of the performances here are proof that Drake's gaunt, under-performed songs do not welcome wobbly bottom-lipped reinterpretation. [Jun 2013, p.81]

Occasional, more straightforwardly anthemic moments approach the mawkishness of Nickelback, but Slipknot remain showmen at heart. [Oct 2008, p.108]

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]

Moody shades of The National and Tunnel Of Love-era Springsteen abound, though the whole thing never quite manages to fully convince. [Mar 2024, p.25]

Crammed with pulse-racing panto-metal par excellence. [Apr 2005, p.97]

His cluttered beatscapes suggest random sounds in search of a meaning. [Mar 2006, p.103]

The result is akin to a John Ford film with an indie soundtrack. [Nov 2018, p.37]

Into The Future is a heroic act of denial, nonetheless. The remaining Brains still burn with magnesium-strip intensity. [Jan 2013, p.82]

As with any enduring soundtrack, this collection of songs stands on its own. [Oct 2019, p.24]

A richer chamber-pop style which now reaches its zenith on Strange Dance. [Mar 2023, p.35]

But this band has no interest in putting everything in plain view; you have to meet them halfway, and that entails traversing bleak terrain on the way to sharing in their hard-earned sense of release. [Dec 2009, p. 98]

There's no grief-striken balladry, though: Michel Poiccard namely sticks to the helium noise vandalism template set by 2008 debut Worldwide, with the addition of some surprisingly winsome pop excursions in a similar vein to The Drums. [Mar 2011, p.86]

Their collaborative debut is inventively dippy. [Dec 2016, p.38]

All too often, though, slick jams such as "Drugs" and "Party With Children" resemble library tracks, exercises in style that pirouette exquistely, but shy away from becoming anything meaningful. [Aug 2010, p.93]

A charming composite of Damon Gough's homespun insight and Edith Piaf's anguish. [May 2005, p.106]

Cadogan's threesome seem an altogether leaner, meaner deal. [Feb 2007, p.78]

Much of [Buckshot's] edge is lost but fans of hip hop's yellowing indie template will find much to enjoy nonetheless. [Sep 2008, p.90]