Beautifully angry tunes cunningly made more accessible through the application o killer dance grooves. [Jun 2021, p.77]

With the other 10 tracks, featuring Roger C Reale’s gruff blues shout and robust brass section, he’s more content to let his liquid economy embellish, deliver spine-tingling solos and drive the funky soul grooves of She’s So Fine and The Go-Getter Is Gone, deploying Soul Man-style hammer riffing on the title track and evoking his Dock Of The Bay on One Good Turn

So J did his usual effortless stand-in thang on guitar, and with Lou writing two beautiful soft rockers and Murph powering away on drums created another album to stand if not quite the equal of the original Dinosaur albums that around the end of the 80s helped change the face of US alternative rock, then somewhere close.

The ultra-catchy pop-punk of old is there in spades, but they're taking a cold hard look at America on This Is Not Utopia. ... Not all gambles pay off. ... A fun romp with a serious undercurrent. [May 2021, p.91]

Showcases an undeniably more varied sonic palette, even if that just means there are more classic bands that its 12 songs remind you of. [May 2021, p.84]

A game of two halves. ... Could please all. Or none. [Apr 2021, p.89]

Collects three albums and apposite era odds 'n' sods. [May 2021, p.97]

In Another World is a remarkable album and another marvellous continuation: power and pop. [May 2021, p.88]

4 lovers of gloriously degraded punk pop. [May 2021, p.88]

Great modern music. [May 2021, p.88]

Ringo has given us expertly produced and pensive meditations on the bigger pictures. [May 2021, p.87]

Cave remains inspirational working widescreen miracles from cataclysmic events. [May 2021, p.85]

An exhilarating, blustery document. [May 2021, p.84]

It's an astonishing set. [May 2021, p.84]

It’s the nearest Strummer has had to a ‘greatest hits’, replicating six tracks from 001, bolstered for diehards by a previously unreleased acoustic demo of Junco Partner, and 2001 Brixton Academy versions of The Clash’s I Fought The Law and Rudie Can’t Fail that so faithfully replicate Mick Jones’s complex arrangements it sounds like Joe giving it some welly over a well-drilled tribute band.

While Showdown and the Lennon cover feel almost jaunty in their lightness of touch, his cover of Guns N’ Roses’ Patience is a broody, brooding acoustic ballad, lonely and haunting.

Their sugar-coated badass swagger might be toothless and adolescent, but sometimes teenage dreams are hard to beat. [Mar 2021, p.87]

Despite the omission of radio sessions and later work, this is a blistering collection of songs by a band at their peak, and a fan-set by and large without compare (the live set alone being a fantastic time machine into a world where cool bands played Mekons covers and swore a lot).

Inevitably, the two extra discs are thick with superfluous alternative and extended mixes. But there are fine non-album singles here too, notably the glossy synth-funk stomper European Son and a plastic-soul remake of Smokey Robinson’s I Second That Emotion. Also included is the four-track Live In Japan EP first released in 1980, and a full live album recorded at the same show. ... Glorious.

Birchwood is still making rowdy brand of blues, seemingly unlikely to suit up or slow down any time soon. [Apr 2021, p.87]

A sultry, smouldering, non-committal vocal meanders over bass-heavy backdrops. [Apr 2021, p.89]

An unlikely masterpiece. [Apr 2021, p.89]

It's Biffy Clyro producer Dan Austin, who adds lustre to YMAS's lonely bones. [Apr 2021, p.89]

Cousins is in remarkable voice, his lyrics better than ever. [Apr 2021, p.87]

The Brighton metalcore band turn their attention both outwards and inwards: ferocious, barely contained rage directed towards global dysfunction and the looming, ever-increasing threats to mankind and the notion of personal responsibility, taking control of destiny. [Apr 2021, p.86]

When You See Yourself is their most clued-in record in a decade. [Apr 2021, p.88]

Detroit Stories is his most concise bolt of precision-tooled heavy rock in 50 years, enhanced by Ezrin’s robust production and Alice on lethal form, vocally and lyric-wise.

[The band] sound like they’re grabbing at big choruses like an alcoholic scrabbling for a bedside breakfast whisky. But on The Feelers, the motoric Spices and Me & Magdalena, Craig Finn’s sneered diatribe about a manipulative rock junkie, they nonetheless stumble across a rich, National-like lustre of dark grooves and opiated euphoria.

As The Love Continues sees Mogwai’s voyage into sound progress in a stately manner as tracks like Here We, Here We, Here We Go Forever and the misnomered Fuck Off Money tread an unlikely fine line between waft and heft.

All 10 songs – here remastered by Andy Pearce and Matt Wortham, also credited on re-issues by Deep Purple, Rory Gallagher et al – sound rich and timeless. ... The fourth CD (discs four and five on vinyl) re-sequences live performances from the March 1973 UK tourheard previously as Live At Last (1980) and part of Past Lives (2002) – but former Free engineer Richard Digby Smith’s new mix proves third time lucky and outshines even the glorious 60-page booklet.

Death By Rock And Roll is their first attempt to claw back what they had. Fortunately it’s brilliant.

You couldn’t call it ravishing (although the way the guitars trickle and scratch over sepulchral bass on Come Bring Your Love before exploding in distortion certainly is). It is, however, an unbidden delight: hypnotic, breathtaking and quite, quite beautiful.

Arguably the most exuberant guitar pop alum of 2020. [Mar 2021, p.87]

The Besnard Lakes might test the listener’s patience at times, but their commendable commitment to monumental scale and ambition often results in something thrillingly beautiful.

Powerful and thought-provoking, if depressing, The Future Bites ultimately asks you to take a good hard look at what the hell you’re doing with your life.

Exuberant throughout, PPC's trip has notched up a gear. [Mar 2021, p.84]

It's the zippiest Foos album to date. ... As a modern rock melting pot, Medicine certainly sounds like a spirit rediscovered. [Mar 2021, p.84]

When You Found Me combines top-notch musicianship and expert songcraft with bags of brooding atmosphere, with Lucero clearly at the top of their southern-rocking game.

LTB’s woes have been rewarded with something remarkable: their best record yet.

This factory runs on goodwill. In less cataclysmic times the exercise might be mawkish, and while a cover of Lean On Me is well-meant it feels a little like eating too much cake icing.

Wasteland's conceptual breadth, depth and complexity may challenge convention but offers rich rewards. [Feb 2021, p.87]

Retains naive charm while delivering occasional brilliance. [Feb 2021, p.87]

A divine meeting of minds, Reluctant Hero is a breathtaking trip unto the unknown. [Feb 2021, p.87]

This 20th-anniversay reissue is a reminder of just how great [White Pony] was and is. ... [Black Stallion is] a uniformly impressive feat of deconstruction and reconstruction. [Feb 2021, p.90]

The results is at once joyous, poignant and heartbreaking. [Feb 2021, p.86]

While something more adventurous might have been the way forward, the singer and his inspirations remain unscathed. [Feb 2021, p.84]

The more abiding feeling we're left with, though, is that high-octane hard pop like this needs just a few more piercing hooks to really raise The Dirty Nil above all the other generic good-time rockers that will give you a fun half-hour in a festival tent but rarely capture your imagination. [Feb 2021, p.84]

Reassuringly awkward. [Jan 2021, p.87]

Brilliant music to dream to as the ship goes slowly down. [Dec 2020, p.81]

The result is a fun, no-frills album, and what it lacks in surprises makes up for with visceral thrills. [Oct 2020, p.86]

These four coloured vinyls boast 18 unreleased gems. [Jan 2021, p.95]

Despite all the gloom, this is a deeply enjoyable album. [Jan 2021, p.87]

A weirdly uncomfortable and exhilarating listening from start to finish. [Jan 2021, p.85]

Bottom line is that live they sound life-affirming. [Jan 2021, p.85]

It's a little naive in its presentation and denotations of homely American Stereotypes, perhaps, but all the more powerful for that. ... Crazy Horse are in fine fettle. [Jan 2021, p.84]

The haters will protest, but this is the sound of metal dragging itself into the future. [Jan 2021, p.83]

It's a concoction that shouldn't work but does. ... Disarming. [Jan 2021, p.82]

Their interplay of conventional instruments is unconventionally jagged, pastoral, abrasive, exotic, heavy and light in equal measure. [Jan 2021, p.82]

III is the sound of a less restless McCartney simply doing what he does best. [Jan 2021, p.86]

In short: 13 hugely enjoyable songs that all sound like old friends. [Dec 2020, p.85]

In some ways the club-sized audience helps Hendrix, who hated large open-air shows, and he’s positively chatty at times on the first set, which includes a feisty In From The Storm and a trebly-sounding Foxy Lady. The second set is looser and in danger of falling apart at times, before Hendrix wakes up and rips through Stone Free.

Blue Oyster Cult continue to do whatever the hell they want. But the good, and perhaps surprising, news, given how long it’s been since we’ve last heard new music from them, is that it’s all good, and in places great.

Compiled with discipline, diligence and no little love, Archives Volume II is an immersive treat. It’s primarily for fans, but even the most casual of acquaintances will find much to adore here. [Jan 2021, p.93]

Intense and stripped back, with only his own art to fall back on, Cave cuts a truly formidable figure. This is an album you will return to again and again. [Dec 2020, p.85]

[Mike Crossey's production] effectively strips them of their core classicism. [Dec 2020, p.85]

Collection of coldly beautiful electronica. [Dec 2020, p.83]

III mostly avoids the genre's penchant for endless navel gazing and just delivers the ear-shattering goods. [Dec 2020, p.83]

The music hits hard enough on its own. [Dec 2020, p.82]

The melodies are sweet and the lyrics still bear his adult-child cartoon whimsy, but there's a dark optimism beneath it all. [Dec 2020, p.81]

While the hazy creep if bleeding skull candles still waft through DVG's music this is essentially a white magick album, pulsating with light and sunshine and bursts of raga-punk exuberance. [Dec 2020, p.81]

What is great about this album is that it conveys a feeling of lethargy, tiredness, the onset of old age, while never sounding tired, lethargic or clapped out. [Dec 2020, p.80]

It can, by nature, feel like drowning in melted marshmallow over 55 minutes, but great moments stick out like ice sculptures in a snowdrift. [Dec 2020, p.80]

A spellbynding brew. [Nov 2020, p.87]

Offering gems, misfires and revelations, Elton: Jewel Box is an absorbing opening of the vaults.

The humanity is palpable throughout his lyrics and delivery, and the album avoids preaching in favour of insightful storytelling, good humour and warmth. [Sep 2020, p.84]

All dozen tracks are winners. [Dec 2020, p.80]

It’s all cracking stuff. The early Motown song Money (That’s What I Want) and Muddy Waters’ Rock Me, Baby add soul, and the studio chatter is worth hearing if only to catch Morrison calling out for Kentucky Fried Chicken and announcing that The Doors’ next album will be called Ride Out.

These now achingly familiar songs never sounded so good. ... An immaculately packaged, multi-format tribute.

23 tracks is too many. ... But when it's good - as on Marc Almond's ballady Teenage Dream or David Johansen's R&B stomp through Get It On, it's great. [Oct 2020, p.84]

The 14 tracks add up to a brilliant work full of confidence and ideas, all laid out on a massive canvas of invention and variety.

A gift for completists, music historians and obsessives. Even for them, approaching it in one sitting is a challenge. Instead it’s better to savour it episodically, because each segment ends on something of a cliffhanger: you can hear her evolve from gamine coffee-shop folkie into a masterful, angel-voiced singer-songwriter as the collection develops.

The best thing about Royal Tea is that every track could easily drop into Bonamassa’s live show – which is more than you can say for Redemption. Back on track in every sense.

Their fourth album takes yet more detours, but without ever losing sight of the path. Devotees of lead-heavy riffs will be spoilt by the title track and Rites Of Passage, and the pace never exceeds sluggish.

This is no pure nostalgia trip, though. Both House Of A Thousand Guitars and Rainmaker take shots at the ‘criminal clown’ in the White House, and Letter To You is as young at heart as any of Springsteen’s proudest moments, a sign that we’re some way off the credits yet.

There’s little to distinguish its 10 tracks from each other, beyond Wishing’s stark, startling verses. It’s a shame, because Fafara clearly believes in what he’s doing, and this is far from a bad album. It’s just not enough to reach beyond the faithful.

An essential album that gets better with every listen. [Nov 2020, p.86]

There's a lot to take in, but Petty was at one of his many peaks and this is worth luxuriating in. [Nov 2020, p.92]

An intricately crafted return to form. [Nov 2020, p.85]

Irresistible. [Nov 2020, p.87]

Well worth (re)discovering. [Nov 2020, p.87]

Thirteen songs, 40 minutes and not a moment wasted. [Nov 2020, p.84]

It's this latter sense of indefatigable positivity that shines through, a sense of togetherness engendered by a celebration of classic, no-nonsense rock'n'roll. [Nov 2020, p.83]

Taylor hasn’t reinvented the wheel here, but he has reinvented himself.

All six albums for Island Records generously expanded. [Oct 2020, p.93]

All the songs get the live treatment from an already available concert recorded in Montreal. Work tapes and a live Sweet Jane and Walk On The Wild Side add heft, but the main work is the thing here.

[Patti Smith is] in her element. [Oct 2020, p.83]