An unusually exciting attempt to revitalise past glories. [Oct 2002, p.111]

Murray Street contains some of the best music Sonic Youth have recorded since the landmark Daydream Nation in 1988. [Jul 2002, p.122]

Really rather magnificent, in its way. [Jul 2002, p.107]

Padded out with too much of the Europap that has blotted Perfecto's scoresheet over the years. [Jul 2002, p.116]

The man is as affecting as ever on this most traditional of collections. [Feb 2003, p.77]

The sing-along antics of the home crowd can be a little irritating. [Aug 2002, p.107]

None of the 12 tracks on Heathen displays anything memorable in the way of melody or chorus, their phrasing short-breathed and tired, their sequences energyless. [Jul 2002, p.108]

Long on rhetoric, short on melodic structure, it's hard going. [Dec 2002, p.150]

While this album is furnished by post-rock's brittle, metallic sound, Prewitt's songs are full of chamber pop's gilded warmth.... A fine, if overlong, album. [Jul 2002, p.118]

What makes B&S great is conspicuous by its absence.... For completists only. [Jul 2002, p.101]

Doves have delivered, with honesty and affection. All other guitar bands this year will seem like a scratchy sideshow. [Jun 2002, p.110]

This is much more than the usual retro-action.... DJ Shadow remains elusive to the end. [Jun 2002, p.127]

Enon inhabit a multi-coloured Seventies soaring pop universe but with... emphasis on crunching guitar breaks, electronic textures and skewed lyrics. [Sep 2002, p.118]

This sees David finally jettisoning his twee heritage for a filmic kitsch. [Jun 2002, p.116]

The first six tracks of pared-down techno loops give way to the ambient sound-and-speech collage of "InterZil" before the metallic funk jackhammers of frenzied current single "Krekc." [Jul 2002, p.106]

Behind the hype and the swagger, he's still baring enough of his soul for The Eminem Show to be compelling theatre. [Aug 2002, p.118]

Terrific stuff. [Aug 2002, p.122]

Another fiercely fashionable and languidly ambitious collective. [Apr 2002, p.108]

Frantic is packed with potential singles, as if he's decided it's not crime to enjoy himself, to embrace foolish things earthier than Avalon. This is classic Ferry, but full of surprises. [May 2002, p.92]

Sounds like the product of a sloppy but inspired band enjoying the straightforward art of making a noise. [Jun 2002, p.114]

A weird and wonderful record. [Jul 2002, p.120]

A mostly thin and needlessly morose album. [Jun 2002, p.108]

They mix wistful, hook-laden rock songs in the vein of Counting Crows, Five For Fighting, The Gin Blossoms, The Posies and Pete Yorn with the proto-emo sound of Sunny Day Real Estate. [Aug 2002, p.104]

The album's undisputed highlights are "Hit Somebody! (The Hockey Song)" and "Genius." [Album of the Month, July 2002, p.100]

Waits does nothing predictable here, and the structure of even the most forlorn tear-jerker is ambitious and avant-something-or-other. [Co-Album Of The Month, June 2002, p.106]

Waits -- now in complete mastery of his unique art -- knows what he's doing, and the stark, unforgiving brutality is leavened, or granted grace, by passages of purple pathos. [Co-Album Of The Month, June 2002, p.106]

This is inventive and witty stuff. [June 2002, p.126]

If it all seems a bit contrived, the end result is harmonious and -- remarkably -- never kitsch. [Aug 2002, p.99]