Few of these chugging bar-room stompers register as earworms, even after repeated listens. [Oct 2015, p.76]

With a live '70s R&B sound fuelled by flower power and, in "Star Now" and "Satellites," some excellent songs, Bilal is as focused as he's ever been. [Oct 2015, p.73]

[The cover of Jason Isbell's "Dress Blues"] is nevertheless the best thing on Jekyll + Hyde, which plunges to a wretched nadir on "Heavy Is the Head." [Oct 2015, p.73]

The group's formula is undeniably infectious, with giddy, harmony-enriched interplay outshining occasional lapses into spindly scuzz. [Oct 2015, p.73]

Technically, he shows himself to be a better singer than we might have predicted from those early lo-fi recordings, but it all tastes a little sweet. [Oct 2015, p.71]

It's excellent stuff. [Oct 2015, p.75]

While the sugary highs could give Van Dyke Parks an ice cream headache, it's hard to resist a work so clearly besotted with the power of music. [Oct 2015, p.78]

Levi's penchant for cracked-up nursery-rhyme melodies and wry humour elevate what might've been an exercise in wilful primitivism. [Oct 2015, p.80]

After two decades, a band that could easily feel like part of the wallpaper remain hungry to show that you never know what lies beneath. [Oct 2015, p.68]

This is an engaging piece of minimalist minimalism: Steve Reich with a battering ram. [Oct 2015, p.71]

No No No is limited overall, and finds Condon's filigreed production out of step with the minimalist balladeering peers who have flourished in his four-year absence. [Oct 2015, p.71]

Indie slackers Hooten Tennis Club demonstrate some unique charms on their debut album. [Oct 2015, p.77]

While no reinvention, Paper Gods is both entertaining ad typically Duran-esque. [Oct 2015, p.75]

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

Turkey is less throwaway than its scrappy, Bandcamp-released predecessors. [Oct 2015, p.78]

Understated and in, places, unfashionable. [Oct 2015, p.83]

Eiesland's emotive vocals and the elegant new wave inspired soundscapes sustain the bittersweet mood even when the songs lack stickiness. [Oct 2015, p.80]

What went Down is their most fully realised yet. [Oct 2015, p.75]

An album of well-crafted discreet songs. [Oct 2015, p.76]

A lugubrious lo-fi treat. [Sep 2015, p.69]

There are moments of genius throughout. [Sep 2015, p.91]

The ornate multitracked chorales retain a heady intensity. [Sep 2015, p.73]

Bad Magic is gloriously genre-defying. [Sep 2015, p.78]

The end result is something that's freaky and funny, as rigorously experimental as it is gleefully entertaining. [Sep 2015, p.82]

It's most persuasive setting is deluxe drive-time melancholia, purring with understated classicism. [Sep 2015, p.69]

Elitism for the People documents Pere Ubu creating their own private musical apocalypse and then forging in to start the world anew. Not a world to be drowned in, but one to treasure. [Sep 2015, p.88]

Frontman Fred Macpherson's pithy musings on London's hipster demi-monde can be excruciating when set against his band's bog-standard stadium churn. [Sep 2015, p.81]

[A] strong final work. [Sep 2015, p.71]