Glitter And Doom Live is an admirable document of yet another stage in his continually engrossing career.

It's more than a mix, pulling out lost takes and reassembling constituent parts--a snatch of Afrka Bambaataa here, a flurry of Liquid Liquid percussion there--with phantasmagorical results. [Feb 2010, p.82]

This release overcompensates handsomely, delivering 48 sharp, gorgeous-sounding missives that document ensemble brilliance and Petty’s chiming, hook-happy American-everykid songwriting.

Stone's impeccable vocal ensures that her past glories thrive on this new frontier. [Mar 2010, p.96]

A gift for deadpan couplets alone can't quite elevate him to [Rufas Wainwright or Pet Shop Boys'] league, [but] this album offer signs that, if he want to, Robbie might escape the neurosis of celebrity and mature into a genuinely witty songwriter. [Dec 2009, p.121]

Fragrant ballads "When The Night" and "Marie Cheri" add a softer dimension to a bold collection on which Annie rarely puts a foot wrong. [Nov 2009, p. 81]

The emotional imprint of The Fall moves beyond the pining, wistful tones that are her trademark in favour of Sex And The City scenarios bursting with heartbreak, regret and emotional devastation.

Created under vows of artistic chastity (one room, no overdubs), yet played with the rambling freedom of an afternoon jam, Recordings...feels like a necessary reaction to Portishead, but seems unlikely as yet to usurp his day job. [Dec 2009, p. 85]

In their careers, this band might prove to be a sideshow. But right now, it's one with the possibility of being as gripping as the main event. [Jan 2010, p. 104]

The lackadaisical nostalgia for childhood beach holidays is certainly evocative--as indeed, is the way Real Estate recall New Jersey Antecedents The Feelies and Yo La Tengo, plus any number of old Flying Nun bands. [Feb 2010, p.96]

It is pure nostalgia, and some of these songs are familiar to the point of tedium, but even a Beatles sceptic would find it hard to suppress a shudder of recognition on hearing these tunes sung by the man who wrote them.

Anyone who ever felt that David Rawlings hid his light under Gillian Welch's bushel-never getting the full credit he merited as her partner and accomplice--will greet his first solo album with a lusty cheer. [Dec 2009, p. 101]

The four-and-a-half minutes of tuning that takes up the first track of this six-disc boxset signals that Live In New York a scrupulously compiled audio verite document - and there's plenty more tuning to come. [Dec 2009, p. 88]

The vocals are muddied, but there are diamond-bright tunes here. [Oct 2009, p.95]

"Runaway" and "Head Into Tomorrow" sound like the songs that Joy Division might have written if they'd hung out with Ewan MacColl. Good, but slightly disorienting. [Nov 2009, p. 81]

Buffed to a hyper-compressed, anodyne sheen by John McLaughlin, The Fountain is so craven in its bid for airplay it even includes an insipid number called "Drivetime". [Nov 2009, p.84]

Dave Huismans brings an aesthetic informed by the metallic echo of Berlin and machine melodies of Detroit to the music's syncopated UK rave logic. [Jan 2010, p. 103]

This two-disc compilation charting the journey suggests it was simply a matter of waiting for Travis to falter, tweaking the Coldplay template and amping up the earnest Celtic bluster. [Dec 2009, p. 113]

If you find it impressive how AC/DC have spun three chords into a 30-year career, then you'll enjoy what they can do with a boxset: Backtracks comes with three CDs, two DVDs, all packaged inside a recession-friendly amplifier. [Jan 2010, p. 103]

For their third album, Githead - that's Wire's Colin Newman, Robin 'Scanner' Rimbaud, and Malka Spigel and Max Franken of Israeli post-punkers Minimal Compact - have partly abandoned the sly hooks of 2007's well-named Art Pop In favour of a leaner and more ambient approach. [Jan 2010, p. 112]

Radian, the Vienna based trio of martin Brandlmayr (drums), Stefan Nemeth (guitars, synthesizers)and John Norman (bass), are a cerebral, digital post-rock outfit whose wibbliness too often leads them into a state of rhythmic paralysis. [Jan 2010, p. 123]

This affinity with Muse is impossible to escape on pounding epics like "That Golden Rule" and "Mountains," but the slight personal "God & Satan" and intriguingly angular "Born On A Horse" offer respite from the bombast, while Queens Of The Stone Age's Josh Homme brings a welcome touch of class to "Bubbles." [Feb 2010, p.79]

All good fun, but inevitably, without Taylor's Longing vocals, it feels a bit like playing a piano with the black keys removed. [Jan 2010, p. 112]

On this mostly splendid debut, meanwhile, Hawk actually fuses two of his previous recording identities bridging the shiny electronic of his Weird Tapes alter ego with the hazy lo-fi psychedelia of its "feminine" mirror image, Memory Cassette. [Jan 2010, p. 116]

Ultimately, Phrazes For The Young testifies that the qualities that made Julian Casablancas so noteworthy in 2001 remain in place, just a little more difficult to predict.

Weezer's likeabe, insubstantial powerpop has often been infused with somewhat tetchy intimations of latent intellectual heft. On Raditude, this manifests in guest appearances by Amrita Sen and Nishat Khan on the dreadful "Love Is The Answer." Elsewhere, though, Weeaee seem to have ceased to care. [Feb 2010, p.107]

Molina's downhome style and tender vocals coalesce with Johnson's frugger voice on minor marvels like "Almost Let You In" and "Twenty Cycles To The Ground", while the tidal hum and strum of "Now, Divide" is moodily unusual. [Dec 2009, p. 103]

While a large proportion of these Swords are decidedly blunt blades, a few could have easily found a place on a greatest hits.