The overbearing problem with Isaac Gracie is just how Isaac Gracie-centric it is.

As to be expected in this setting, the collaborations are occasionally guilty of overindulgence.

Although Wasser has perhaps sounded better in the past and too many of the songs stretch past their welcome, The Classic is a welcome addition to Joan As Police Woman's repertoire and a recommended addition to any album collection due to its impressive ability to surprise and innovate as it moves forward.

Save for a few tweaks, she doesn’t go to great lengths to expand upon the musical formula that’s served her to date.

It’s a mostly successful and far more mature record; it just has to be seen as a more grown-up Anthems for Doomed Youth rather than the anthems from doomed youth that they previously brought.

For all its unwieldy eccentricity, Good Sad Happy Bad is still fascinating.

Unfortunately, these [familiar touches] are huddled together rather than woven throughout the album, breaking the illusion of a perpetual contrast. When Solide Mirage eventually hits its mark though, it’s impossible not buy into Marry’s idea of a changeable album that dreams of unity and addressing frustrations through as many channels as possible.

Ultimately though, there are too many times here where these tracks sound too contrived and calculated, a false approximation in place of the real thing.

It may lack slightly in ambition but in terms of fulfilling Plantman's ideology to make gimmick free, classically-tinged emotive songs it does just fine.

A record which clearly finds contentment in its sonic solitude.

Sure, with ‘This Is Really Going To Hurt’, Flyte have successfully echoed the sounds of the past, but it’s all about as paper-thin as a yellow-hued Instagram filter.

‘Light Years Out’ is an ill-advised journey into electro-funk territory but overall, ‘Names of North End Women’ is an interesting work that shows Ranaldo has retained all his youthful capacity for innovation and experimentation.

It doesn’t quite match the intensity and impact of his debut.

Without any real substance to the lyrics, these soft, earnest, mild guitar songs come across like their author has grossly overestimated their depth. The album as a whole sounds like fourteen-year-old boyfriend music.

The songs here mostly lack the sonic power and impact of those on its predecessor, but they do accomplish the not inconsiderable task of making Sean’s angular guitars sit alongside Pascal Stevenson’s synths congruously on tracks like ‘Ego’ and ‘Keep Out’. Post-punk bands of various eras have transitioned to new wave over the course of three or four albums, but Moaning have done that with just two.

There’s a decidedly different tone to proceedings. World Peace is None of Your Business feels infinitely more concise, and musically more defined.

The lack of time taken for ii to form itself--no weeks off to go back and reconsider minor changes, no reigning in the level of experimentation--gives the album the feel of a jam, but without falling into an undefinable mess.

An enigma made by a puzzle, ESTOILE NAIANT is as compelling and as unusual as the musician who refuses to tell you his name or show you his face.

Caramel is certainly a strange album, but it’s not alienating or difficult to engage with.

This is an album with ambition; a sonically sweeping piece of work with big themes and big ideas that can overwhelm you. Just let nature take its course.

Just like humanity’s primordial obsession with fire, Sky Swimming is difficult to disengage with.

This album may declare itself a painting--and an intense one, at that--but there’s a much bigger picture to see here.

Filled with polyrhythms and squalling synths designed to get people on the dancefloor, it’s sometimes impossible to remain rooted in your seat. The drawback of this focus on the high-energy though, is that it can get a little wearing.

With just about enough sonic variation to keep things interesting, there’s a more pristine, altogether more polished feel to this collection of tracks no doubt the result of an artist who’s getting closer to refining their craft.

Despite opener 'Shape' being a colossal Bjork channelling beauty that comes close to breaking point, the bulk of Interiors is restless but unassuming.

Channelling zeitgeisty pop is by no means always a bad thing; but when omitting the earwormy choruses it needs - and removing your own personality in the process, it’s only ever going to fall a bit limp.

This album should plant El Khatib as someone to keep a close watch on. For now though, there’s still room for him to grow--another trip to the desert awaits.

After a debut that spent much of its time slinking like crawlers out in the shadows, it’s intriguing--if slightly disconcerting--to see Purity Ring in a warmer light.

Good Grief marks an important next step in the realisation of their sassy pop character.

Perhaps this a record that works better under the summer sun, but right now Ride Your Heart doesn’t sound much more than a showcase for surfy style and lo-fi charm.

An album which blurs the line between retro and futuristic techno, yet always with an analogue soul.

Phoned-in and simplistic, it’s hard to decipher when one track ends and another begins.

As far as debuts go, the Sydney trio have made a solid first step here. They’ve got half the job worked out in spades. Now, they just need to work on making it memorable.

These songs [The Trapper and the Furrier, Tornadoland, and Obsolete] are, ironically, more cinematic than anything found on her last album ‘What We Saw From The Cheap Seats,’ and that sense of drama helps make Remember Us To Life a return to form.

It is fair to say that the album is missing hooks; it is a difficult listen and the tracks’ sparseness renders them similar. But, when the sound is so spine-tinglingly moving, that’s not too much of a problem.

Unfortunately, although that slight detachment feels pretty good in the midst of listening, much like tucking into an ice cream cone with more than a few sprinkles, you might get brain freeze trying to recall some of the tunes afterwards.

The supergroup’s self-titled record might feature the dirty rock of the former and the latter’s penchant for synth-led tangents, but by each party’s style rubbing off on the other, they’ve also sanded them down.

Earth might be musically faultless, but it lacks the bite of his day job.

Fans might see this as a boon - Bainbridge picking up from where they left off before their self-imposed hiatus. To others, it may sound like a missed opportunity to establish themselves as a more cutting-edge artist.

Granted, his sixth effort is as bonkers and creative as ever, but it could be that less really is more.

'Dry Land Is Not A Myth' is a mixed bag. Church's high-pitched voice could prove to be a bit marmite, as could the songs on here without much focus. Clocking in a couple minutes over a half-hour though, it's short enough to deserve at least one spin this summer.

All too often Welcome The Worms lacks the bite that’d make it Very Good Indeed

Semicircle won’t seem like a giant leap for the band but is yet another upbeat, buoyant addition to their canon, injected with an even greater sense of community spirit.

The result is a composed collection of tracks.

‘Jaded’ undoubtedly brings with it a glimmer of hope in an album that ultimately comes up short in delivering the fusion of intensity and melody that has served GRMLN so well before.

Cameron may drench his songs in luscious, sweeping strings, but this is more akin to a gritty neo-noir thriller with numerous femme fatales haunting him at every turn.

Invitation to Her’s is an occasionally jarring listen, thanks to its stylistic restlessness, but there’s enough substance behind the silliness to leave you feeling they’re following through on their early prom

For while standout ‘These Depopulate Hours’ fizzes with what has made the Glasgow group so inviting in the past - a bubbling menace underpinning everything thanks to a screaming synth - and ‘What Makes You A Man’ employs curious sounds to back its ‘80s influences, it’s not matched by what’s found elsewhere.

Expectations [are] built by her collaborators - who aided artists like Dua and Kylie in carving revered pop niches - weigh detrimentally on the record: it doesn’t push itself nearly as far. Yet, undeniably, it’s a dependable, invigorating debut.

There's so much to like about Mirrors The Sky that could've been loved instead.

Uninspiring, unexciting, largely forgettable--this is nothing more than Kings of Leon by numbers.

For the most part, this is a record about chasing a specific kind of pop aesthetic instead, which largely comes at the detriment of any kind of real connection.

Chunky, neatly devised and deeply satisfying--this is the sound of staring into a black winter puddle while a nearby bird squirts a veneer of soothing melody onto proceedings.

This is a good start but, after losing half of their line up, you get the feeling Jonquil need to add a bit more character, and a bit more bite, into their new pop noise.

Following two discouraging albums, Need Your Light represents another stumble in the New Yorkers’ career. A disappointment.

HÆLOS are clearly intent on shunning tradition. With that in mind, this is a promising start.

‘(self-titled)’ is Vegemite: the same, but different. When he strips it right back - ‘Prior Warning’, with its bleak reminiscing reflected by a sonic hark back to the London scene in which he made his early name, and the stark ‘Dangerous Game’, where Marcus’ voice allowed to linger for just the right amount of time - there’s a warm quality to his songwriting that seeps through.

It is far too adult oriented rock and middle of the road to be anything but the sound of a band coasting, rather than making waves.

The events of two years ago might have left Cullen dejected, but he’s managed to spin beauty out of those bad times.

Yes, at times it does drag a little and--though clever and often charming--the content isn’t particularly inspiring.

Breton have made a record that draws upon their art foundations more than their first.

Perhaps it’s even a more accessible album for smoothing off the edges and toning down the vitriol, but it’s also largely forgettable in a way that Frank Turner’s best could never be accused of.

'Sit Tight', 'Melting', 'Never Get Tired' and 'All In One Day' all make you imagine the band having a really grand time recording this, but you'd have a hard time figuring out where these songs are going.

An album which feels lovingly crafted, full of moments that only reveal themselves after multiple listens.

The LA quintet’s third album doesn’t quite explode as much as it hopes to, though a few songs threaten to, largely the acid-tongued, grinding ‘Roadkill’ and the vintage-sounding title track.

Allah-Las’ third album rambles as it soars, and with a distinct disregard for convention, it paints a picture of life at its most freewheeling.

Pray For Rain is a sophisticated progression for Pure Bathing Culture. Despite brief drizzly moments, on the whole the album evokes the warmth of drying off after a torrential downpour.

It's more than good, but it could have been great.

The eight-minute sprawl of ‘Don’t Blame Yourself’, too, is wildly self-indulgent and could have had at least a couple of minutes lopped off. Ultimately, though, he sounds rejuvenated on Star Stuff, and that bodes well for whatever he has lined up next.

Often, it’s an insightful and engaging look into what it feels like to be of everywhere and nowhere simultaneously, without alienating anyone simply looking for a catchy pop song. It’s simply a shame that Baio didn’t alienate some of his own desires to wander through genres.

While Kindly Now consequently makes for interesting, albeit heavy listening, the prospect of Henson’s next move is now all the more intriguing.

Unfortunately, that sense of immediacy isn’t always present. Sometimes it shows that From Deewee was rehearsed many times and things get a little bit too mechanical in the middle. It’s still easy to find yourself getting wrapped up in it though and, when it hits, it’s easy to hear why Soulwax are hailed as such innovators.

An exhaustingly incoherent listen.

Though a dulcet voice the lass may have, some of the songs prove all too 'big' for her.

Without close inspection, without consistent rotation it does every bit as good a job at sounding fast and heavy as anyone could be expected to. It’s just hard to know what makes it Creative Adult and what, despite shouting so very loud, it wants to actually say.

‘It Won’t Always Be Like This’ is inexplicably reanimating the era’s penchant for plodding, drive-time indie-rock.

This balance between a sweet, butter wouldn’t melt surface and a resolutely ballsy undercurrent means that, over the course of eleven tracks, the album is never predictable.

While their new guise has them in a more experimental mood - injecting doses of nostalgia all over the shop - it also doesn’t quite possess the same level of clout as before.

It’s lighthearted and radio-ready and fun while being marginally original about it, and that’s okay.

Extension relies not just on quality component parts (of which there are many here), but too on tender placement and a development which holds some compassion for the listener. On this rich but straggling album, of Montreal fail on both accounts.

TV Priest's debut is good but not necessarily enough to poke through the maelstrom quiet yet.

Mixed, fidgety, but rewarding.

The main issue with this album is that it is not terrible and it is not brilliant. It is simply there.

The record surprises far more frequently than his previous material, despite never straying too far from his initial sound.

‘When You See Yourself’ sounds like a jolt back into something potentially promising: there could still be life in the old Kings yet.

The result is an album that’s pleasant but kind of passes you by, and for a singer that was always so charismatic, being just ordinary feels like a bit of a bummer.

‘graves’ may not be a huge musical departure, but it’s a sign Purity Ring still have ideas left in them yet.

While this collection is his slickest, most watertight LP, it does little to push his sound or songwriting forward.

Lonely and desolate at times, the album would benefit from being reigned in slightly - amongst the 19 tracks is a brilliant 12 or 13 songs that, despite the subject matter, deserve to see the light of day.

An indie-disco hit, or a gorgeous ballad are only a blink away from dead in the water mediocrity and if you’re not patient with the album you might be tempted to write the whole thing off. Don’t though. It’s worth it.

The Days Run Away is a simple, pleasant, good-at-what-it-does indie pop album, but nothing spectacular.

On Scatter, Crushed Beaks find their a solid centre, as well as a gift for urgent, spangly melody.

It has a tendency to be superfluous--a stray tabla rhythm is never too far away--but ultimately it’s a fun record that’s clearly born of love and dedication. That’s something to be commended.

While Untogether is immaculately put together, it does take a while to cross over and connect with you.

The delightfully obtuse and sometimes anxious sketches on Arcadia are what make it both enjoyable, and frustrating.

Frequent changes in instrumentation and tone ultimately make Oczy Mlody feel unfocused, and without any of the band’s signature flamboyance to fall back on, it makes for a dull listen.

While fans of the band's more lo-fi beginnings may stare, open-mouthed, bemused at the central role played by synths on Forcefield, there's every chance they'll be gaining a whole slew of newbies, should these many choruses be set loose.

Rat Boy works best on this record not giving the fans what they want--but something new.