“Son” and “Chernye Tsvety” feel a mite glossier than their earlier records, which had a smudged and lo-fi feel that gave them the quality of samizdat recordings. Still present and correct, though, is a sense of dislocation and alienation that’s positively Kafkaesque. [Oct 2024, p.37]

It comes from a place of vulnerability, but speaks the language of strength and self-belief, with enough to share around. [Oct 2024, p.38]

On this ninth album of originals, Rev frontman Jonathan Donahue elects to vocalise in a soft whisper rather than his characteristic starry-eyed warble. It works best when their chamber-pop soundbaths are punctuated by rhythmic hooks and ear-catching lines. [Sep 2024, p.37]

The fourth album by childhood friends Carlotta Cosials and Ana Perrote is a masterclass in simple but devastatingly effective melodies. [Oct 2024, p.36]

Generally things are slower and less musically direct, and so you have an amalgamation of alt.rock, leftfield folk, pop, jazz and touches of electronica. However, while stylistically varied, it can feel a little lacking in variety and dynamism at times, as it very much sits in mid-tempo mode for much of the 12 tracks, the sprightly pop of their early period rarely appearing. Johnson feels nicely in sync with his band though, who possess both precision and personality in their playing. [Oct 2024, p.42]

Manning Fireworks, his third studio album and maybe his best, sounds like the Drive-By Truckers backing Vic Chesnutt. [Sep 2024, p.36]

Hang In There With Me radiates everything great about Rigby’s trademark Phil Ochs-y folk-punk, and the spectacular “Dylan In Dubuque” is a droll, defiant promise of more where it came from. [Sep 2024, p.39]

The opening, “Sky Hooks” is beguiling, too, while “Hooked Paw” amps up the dub and woozy quotients to unique effect. [Sep 2024, p.39]

Enumclaw’s second album further confirms the impression of a group combining most of the virtues of The Replacements at their snottiest and Violent Femmes at their most confrontationally awkward. [Sep 2024, p.30]

He’s on top form for the slow-burning, “Wish You Were Here”-ish title track and the wonderfully dreamy “Sings”. .... A hidden gem is the bonus track “Yes, I Have Ghosts”, a harp-led Celtic waltz that’s as affecting as anything in Gilmour’s canon. [Oct 2024, p.34]

Talkie Talkie benefits from a sharpening of focus even if the instrumental foursome remain determined to recombine such normally disparate elements as sun-scorched psych, Caribbean rhythms, Turkish disco and the kind of rock bravura rarely captured outside of an ’80s movie soundtrack. [Oct 2024, p.31]

Anderson's admiration and affection for this feminist icon is such that you come away from Amelia with a greater respect for those who keep on taking risks. [Sep 2024, p.28]

This is deluxe lava-lamp music, pleasantly pretty at worst, hypnotically beautiful at best. [Sep 2024, p.33]

Woodland is ultimately about these two people, these two voices, and these two guitars. Never is it more moving than when there are simply playing together the way they might at home, blurring the line of who is singing lead on “Howdy Howdy” or who is picking which note on “The Bells & The Birds”. Adding new flourishes to their core sound, Woodland is a beautiful addition to their catalogue. [Oct 2024, p.63]

Reunited with his band, orchestrated and multiplied, Cave surfs a swelling tide of preposterous proportions. He is the wild god, a wearied charismatic presence, flitting between the songs. Nobody else sounds like this. [Oct 2024, p.26]

Though the more sweeping likes of “Black Heart” evoke the menace and grandeur of Angelo Badalamenti’s scores for David Lynch, there’s an appealing degree of rattle, clatter and noodling elsewhere as Wallumrød and Silvola commune with the spirits of Harry Partch and Charles Mingus. [Oct 2024, p.41]

Squint hard and it could be Beck’s Midnite Vultures run through a flanger pedal and recorded on a Maxell C60, but that’s no bad thing. [Oct 2024, p.34]

There’s a suitably euphoric rush to tracks such as “Sun Come Up” and “Golden Hour” as McAlmont’s vocals soar gloriously over Dickson’s layered synths, the banging dance rhythms and surging choruses evoking Ibiza rather than California, Faithless rather than The Beach Boys. [Aug 2024, p.35]

Foster's processed vocals roam the album's glossy surfaces and robotic grooves, evoking Prince and Daft Punk, while the widescreen title track and the trippy "Glitchzig" sound like outtakes from the Tron soundtrack. [Sep 2024, p.32]

It feels as though the band have carved out a new sonic space for them to operate in while still retaining their own identity. [Sep 2024, p.32]

Running the gamut from freakbeat to post-Sabbath blues rock to dark prog invention. [Sep 2024, p.50]

Ian Gillan doesn’t attempt as many sky-scraping howls as he once did but still delivers characteristically rascal-ish lyrics such as “Lazy Sod” and “A Bit On The Side” with swagger and relish. [Aug 2024, p.32]

The chugging arrangements are often overwrought, and the lyrics slightly too pleased with themselves, but Hawk's lusty baritone croons lend passion and swagger to salacious funk-pop confessional "Big Cat Tattoos" and the sardonic, self-lacerating "Questionable Hit". [Sep 2024, p.33]

Dwyer's unique hiccupping rhythm continues to dominate, ensuring the band are distinctively Osees, but this is the group's most experimental and unusual record for a few years. [Sep 2024, p.37]

This is much more of an Esperanza Spalding album than a Milton Nascimento one. But what Spalding has been able to do successfully is subsume herself into the world that Nascimento has created over the last 50 years – a dreamlike realm of folkloric myth, plugged into nature’s heartbeat. [Aug 2024, p.28]

Warmer and more upbeat than One Day, Another Day hangs around just long enough to make an impact. [Sep 2024, p.32]

KGLW now take their foot off the gas via this countrified, ’70s rock’n’roll set with a warm, relaxed air. [Sep 2024, p. 37]

It’s a decent primer on the culture, but the real treasures are the deep cuts, namely some radical dub remixes of punk also-rans (Generation X’s “Wild Dub”, Angelic Upstarts’ “Different Dub”) and a string of projects from Dennis ‘Blackbeard’ Bovell, including the gloomy skank of 4th Street Orchestra’s “Za-Lon” and Matumbi’s sunny, horn-powered “Point Of View”. [Aug 2024, p.53]