On paper then, Finding Forever has the dubious distinction of being the equal of "Be". In practice, its jaded formula falls someway short of the genuine energy of its predecessor's finer moments.

A likeable fusion though it is, there's none of the innovation of the much groovier The XX, nor are there the soaring peaks and chilly troughs, bonkers FX or even the gauche emotion that propels most dance music.

Can she master the bustle and colour of Latin pop as easily as she mastered sweaty electro? Tristemente, no. While never less than agreeable, Mi Plan is rarely more than that.

The trouble is that while STP may have lived dangerously, they play safe musically. There's plenty here that's pleasant, but there's nothing startling, nothing challenging.

Blackout is business as usual. Courting publicity more shamelessly than that infamous kiss with Madonna, Britney writhes, moans and generally gives good pillow talk for the duration of an album where crunk, glitches, squeaks and clubbed-up beats dominate.

We'll take it any day over the bloated, self-important MOR of the Big Rap Stars (stand-up Nas) but hipster rap still has a way to go if it's to prove more than a passing fad.

Little more than comic book soundbites, wilting in the jagged, feverish shadow of their illustrious forefathers.

Whacking on the slap and going electro needn't have felt so dysfunctional--the songs do hold up--but a complete disjunction in styles sounds confusing and ultimately robs the album, and perhaps her comeback, of an identity.

Much of 'Amazing Grace' is the tired evidence of a man rehashing the same ideas - rather than sounds and movements - like a robotic, assembly line Andy Warhol.

There is far too much irritating hippywaffle amongst these gems.

It is hard to tell where No Doubt starts and the producers end.

There's a good album in here crying to be let out.

Essentially if you like the bands that have so clearly influenced Stellastarr* you'll like this record. But it's difficult to really love a band that haven't yet found a voice they can truly call their own.

Pretty much a repeat of an earlier 1990 compilation.

Kid Rock's sound rarely deviates from the explosive metal guitar rap synthesis he has made his trade mark...It is when Kid Rock strays from these familiar musical pastures that he gets into trouble, as in the case of 'Abortion', a rather pathetic attempt at soul...

Their strength lies in Turner's lyrical precision, his way of taking a scalpel to the minutiae of real life to make his heckling of fluorescent adolescents, weekend rock stars and scumbags seem like more than just booze-maddened ranting. Here, Turner's words aren't as direct.

Santogold, then, is a great 21st century cut and paste pop record: self-conscious, referential and catchy as hell. Buy it, love it...then chuck it away and buy a newer model.

Brandon Flowers has a horrible, honking seal bark of a voice.... Faced with this significant disadvantage, The Killers have cannily crafted a wall-of-sound songwriting style so bombastic it almost suits Flowers' sledgehammer vocals.

The Fame is a very unusual beast: a sparkling pop album crammed with infectious melodies that you somehow never, ever want to hear again.

In their attempt to induce dreams, though, too much of Alpinisms is a laptop-gazing wash out, neglecting the intensity required for this kind of thing, and "Prince Of Peace" inhabits a disturbing world where Enya might front an electronically-enhanced baggy band.

Swift's thoughtful honesty and surprisingly articulate take on life should be commended.

The problem is, Go Hard's constantly unsure if it wants to top the charts of its own accord, dominate Radio 1 with big-name collaborations or avoid getting friendly with the mainstream at all, and so flits between the three hoping no one will notice.

Norah's most personal collection of songs to date.

The melodies are mostly jaunty and the stoner harmonies solar-powered enough to lull around your brain but there’s no disguising the fact it’s a disappointingly one-dimensional record stuffed with half-baked ideas (“The Start”) and devoid of a single original thought.

The formula here is for Frusciante to carve tunes out of loose, cyclical riffs, a few basic samples and drum programmes and his own parched voice. Sometimes, as on 'Remain', the effect is slightly uncomfortable... Tough that out, and get used to the demo quality throughout, and there are some decent songs on 'To Record Only Water,' endearing for their rawness and honesty.

A curiously unsatisfying odds'n'sods album.

Busta seems to be treading water too often.

By letting inferior guests share his stage, Beck only reminds us what a unique and gifted individual he is.

Death Magnetic at least proves that 40-something millionaires can make a valiant fist of recapturing the fury of youth. Sadly, though, it seems that Metallica will never be 20-years-old again.

'Under Construction' isn't a retro album, so much as it's informed by both new and old. But it also isn't beyond question whether this return to roots doesn't conceal a lack of inspiration.

This shiny collection of pop, folk, blues, country and rock is mostly about as emotionally engaging as watching Mr Spock watch paint dry... in the dark.

The fact that experimental, abstract beats have become so popular is partly down to him, but now that everybody's doing it, he has to do it more, or better, or different.

It's just not ambitious enough, lacking the impact to draw new fans in while just about satisfying those already captivated by the band’s admirable class.

She's got an album which for all its sing-along moments is neither catchy nor extreme enough to be exceptional.

On the surface it's an undeniably appealing package, and craftwise, there's much to admire.

'Love Is Here' - expansively, expensively produced, lavish yet aspiring to understatement (if such a contradiction can be accepted) and containing some affecting songs - is a pretty good record.

It's probably safer to view "Gettin In..." as the sound of an old man lying back in the ocean with well-deserved drink. A straight-up collection of rock n roll songs that he probably enjoyed playing on as much as anything else in his bizarre life.

An album of patchy brilliance but with far too many freewheeling moments.

[Their] apathy really detracts from the heartfelt nature of the music, which, produced by the anthemic hand of Youth, is mostly of the passionate, chest-thumping variety.

As is so often the case though all it takes is a fall to flush away fanciful tendencies and with All The Plans they revisit wholesale what it was that made them a draw in the first place (other than sounding a bit like Coldplay).

Despite the hilarious wordplay though, it's hard to imagine anyone returning over and over to the actual tunes, you're far better off with a DVD and its accompanying visual gags.

Creatively however, it's not moved forward from 'The Man Who' enough to convince those of us who were already getting bored with the setlist at Glastonbury last year.

For the first four tracks, The Verve dig deep into their chaotic history to conjure the strange, intoxicating mix of stridency, shimmering beauty, pretension and vulnerability that made them so distinctive back in their pomp. And then the plot is suddenly lost, along with the tunes.

Should you own the band’s magnificent first three singles (collected on the “Three EPs” mini-album), it’s hard to imagine you’ll ever really need another record by this conceptually brilliant, artistic dead-end of a band.

While the sound is distinctly Crowded House, it’s darker than previous offerings.

If you’ve heard one song by The Bravery you’ve pretty much heard them all. The keyboard settings may change, as do the guitar FX pedals, but there’s a formula at work here and how much you get out of this record depends entirely on how interesting you find that formula.

Many of The Libertines' finer qualities are made all too apparent in their absence on "Down In Albion", none quite so painfully as Carl Barat's Django Reinhardt via Johnny Marr charm with a guitar.

This may be a much welcomed return for Lady Sovereign from the wilderness, but in the case of Jigsaw, it would seem that she's missing a few pieces to make this comeback a complete success.

Back On My B.S. is 50 minutes of largely no-nonsense Busta, fist firmly planted in the mid-'90s. Of course, with that we get the expected ups and downs, but what Busta lacks in album length longevity, he makes up for in force.

But for all its feel-good factor and predominantly strong songwriting, 'Sha Sha' does have its forgettable filler tracks and near-misses and generally needs a stronger, more individual voice to help it stand out from an already heaving crowd of young American singer/songwriters.

Hit and miss, then, but certainly brave and bold.

What he doesn’t have, but desperately needs, is a little of bit of grit.

All told, it's a rag-tag collection, and one that comes short of the band's high standards even allowing for the commercial backlash.

There are precious moments on here and hints that something truly magnificent could emerge in time, but first Broadcast need to work out exactly where they're going and why.

Aside from whatever awaits Rilo Kiley if they discover, like Courtney Love before them, that deliberately setting the dial to AOR doesn't guarantee success--is the seam of graceless contrivance. Not just musically--but lyrically.

As musically competent and beautifully-produced as this record undeniably is, strip the vocals and you'd be hard-pushed to identify it as being an Oasis album or enjoy it accordingly.

The rest is a lacklustre recast of her debut that displays about as much personality as Duffy's sweetly banal interviews, all of which suggests her production team are a weakened bunch. Like we said, a remarkable return.

This is an album rich in feminine delicacy and woodsy magic, but ultimately Campbell will remain far too fey for many.

Time and time again, this patchy album is dragged down by obscenely flashy production, a surfeit of ideas that conspire only to sabotage the songs themselves and writ large across it all, Fyfe Dangerfield's interminable, platitudinous emoting.

The problem lies in the fact that The Stooges have nothing left to say.

Mostly though this is bland Hollywood fodder masquerading as something more.

An incredibly accomplished record, a true testament to the band’s imagination, intellectual curiosity and outrageous musical talent.... Unfortunately, “Frances The Mute” is also awful.

It is one thing to not take yourself to seriously but it is quite another to go to the other extreme. For all his knowing winks, Green walks the fine line between decadency and distaste.

Drum and Bass dons Noisia have been roped in on production duties and they've put a fair deal of weight into tracks that might otherwise have sounded flat.

Overall you're left with the aural equivalent of an unexpectedly comfy bed in a cheap hotel--relaxing, welcoming, unexpectedly pleasant, but eminently forgettable.

In the long, twisted canon of break-up albums, Everett doesn't only miss the mark, but makes arguably the first serious misstep of his career.

Many of the tracks (including "Positive Tension" and "This Modern Love") are so choppy and discontinuous as to give you the same nauseous feeling you get when you hear a Mars Volta record.

This CD will sell solely on Eminem's four contributions, which include the uncommonly restrained current single 'Lose Yourself'.

If you can manage to put such quibbles aside--and it will be a struggle--Light After Dark has some redeeming features.

Problem is, much of this record is just Game keeping up with the Joneses: everything you'd expect from a 2008 rap album is here (Lil' Wayne guest spot; boring, '80s-styled Kanye track), and the stuff that makes him unique seems harder than ever to get at.

As the title suggests, this album is - deliberately, you feel - a thwarted pleasure, any sweetness and warmth being spiked with discordance and bitterness.

He can't seem to decide whether he wants to make a straightforward hip-hop remix of Jay-Z's tunes, quirky sampladelia like DJ Steinski or Coldcut, or an avant-garde project in the vein of plunderphonic composers John Oswald and Negativland. A lot of the time, he falls awkwardly between the three camps.

It's just hard to find much of Jeff himself in these amiable, head-nod-friendly, immaculately crafted but ever so slightly sterile tracks.

The overriding impression is that “The Documentary” could be the biggest fanboy album of all time... and that The Game, as much as he thinks he’s a player, is being played by others far more powerful than himself.

Ultimately, on the strength of The Golden Mile, the longevity of The Peth seems, at best, questionable.

The Charlatans have cottoned on to the electro-is-back wave, but not in a cool, Spank Rock or New Young Pony Club sense, but a magpie parody, a homage.

Lopez mostly sticks to a successful formula - R&B lite with a Latin touch.

It's not that Foxx can't sing.... It's not even really the lack of stunning songs. It's the fact that his super slick, super smooth R&B hasn't been either cool or fashionable for more than a decade.

Robbed of any arch qualities they might previously have hinted at, Art Brut are shown up as cuddly pop-comedians happy to tell the same joke over and over, devoid of any real insight and normal to the extent that you half-expect Argos to launch into a diatribe against aeroplane food.

A bitterly disappointing, lacklustre album that is sadly short of distinct memories of any kind.

Lower your expectations a level and there's a decent enough rock album; tight, stylistically roughed-up and actually sounding much more like The Libertines than you expect.

Most of the tracks here could be Pavement, so those looking for a diversion will be disappointed. Those looking for another Pavement record for their collection will be less so, but ultimately this sounds like a hurried release and more of an extension of the past than an indication of the future.

It’s not Razorlight’s reflected experience that’s the problem, though, nor their clichéd rock‘n’roll romanticism - it’s the bewildering narrowness of their sonic vision.

Uncle Dysfunktional won't compel a new generation to discover the back catalogue or question the popular depiction of the Mondays as cartoonish buffoons.

With personnel changes and a series of guest artists the names of which ever-increasingly overshadow whatever actual sounds they're making, Massive Attack have fought a continual struggle to surpass 1994's 'Protection'.

Red Carpet Massacre is largely just a ham-fisted example of what happens when fame, ego and squandered major label cash equate to a sad, missed opportunity.

Evidently it's his source material that defines him, and this time it's disappointingly weak.

In a nutshell this is The Beatles most average album with some of the fluff removed.

So despite the new outlook and lofty declarations, why does 'Falcon' fail to take off? The fault lies partly in Fray's parochial outlook.

What remains... is a jerky, cocksure indie group striving to be accepted as a proper grown-up Southern Rock band, without the guts, depth or tunes to carry it off.

The Time Of Our Lives is a great pop EP drowning in a sea of bilge.

This "Baby…" is bloated and bursting from its nappies - and that goes for the songs as well as duration.

The mixed messages are infuriating, and the complete lack of soul or identity perplexing.

Really, this isn't really a Run DMC album, they're just guests on it.

You’d believe this was a “Weird Al” Jankovic record had you tuned in halfway through.

There are no surprises or unexpected turns and the overall dearth of spontaneity ensures an empty and shallow experience.

While A Place To Bury Strangers are obviously still in awe of the original shoegaze crowd, Exploding Head is a step towards sounding unique.