Unfortunately, the plodding repetition soon rears its ugly head again, and stays for the duration.

Its conceptual limits are conspicuously narrow.

Chalice Hymnal drifts a lot and while every song is distinguished, too often shorter tracks don’t feel as fully developed as their longer brethren.

Big and bold when it hits, underwhelming and otherwise transient elsewhere, it’s a debut that manages to occasionally impress while leaving a lot to be desired.

The problem with Human (the album) is that it feels like it’s been over tooled for success, that the commercial facets of his talents have been blown up at the expense of what might have actually made him interesting.

Quite the mess all told.

Alas, The Temple of I & I, does not hit the high benchmarks of prior quality. Very much a Thievery album in its own right, with the tropical rhythms alongside the DC-based musicians approach to studio-dub, the LP falls short of the classic peak moments of the past.

A rather average document, already a relic on arrival, with about three standout songs among a soporific wash of over-polished Flying Nun imitations.

He’s Got the Whole This Land Is Your Land in His Hands is by no stretch of the imagination the most disagreeable Joan of Arc record to date, or the most impenetrable, either; some of the soundscapes here are pleasingly smooth given how scattershot Kinsella’s approach so often is.

In subduing and possibly internalising his animalistic anger and youthful vigour, the introspective search for his new identity is yet to bear any real musical fruit.

This is a perfect introduction to new Gainsbourg fans and long standing followers will find plenty to get behind, it just feels that something might have been lost in translation somewhere along the lines.

You get lost in them but not in a good way, and the hypnotic nature of SOHN’s music makes it very easy to phase out, which is a shame, because the closing song, 'Harbour', is a raw and vulnerable gamble that pays off well.

Welcome, Stranger!, unfortunately, leaves the listener largely nonplussed. And while a lot of these tracks are perfectly nice-sounding, it feels a bit tragic to consign a record by the Blue Aeroplanes to the background.

This record tames its chosen songs, moulding them into softer and smoother beasts, and producing altogether sanitised interpretations.

Whether they choose in the future to extend their reach into more abstract or formless areas is up to them, but there are signs here that it could be fruitful for them. Nevertheless, as a debut album, Mechanism displays two musicians with a clear facility for evoking visual landscapes and narrative drama.

Ultimately Life On the Road can only work as a comedy project, and musical comedy needs to be richer than this to be worth visiting more than once. You need to be Flight of the Conchords to pull that off, and David Brent just isn’t likeable or interesting enough.

What we get is an interesting departure from his usual work, but not interesting enough to create the eternal music that he is talented enough to execute.

Starboy is fine, it’s grand and it will do, and it really should be so much more.

As a whole, Remain Calm dies too quickly, leaving the listener hanging on the sandy, sunset-lit horizon of 'Mob of Waters'; 'I’ll Keep Going' stretches its melancholic (and mostly static) air a minute too long; and while the concept of 'Xhill Stepping' as dissected electro amuses on paper, its dry deserted dancehall yields nothing but empty space.

Though it would have been nice to feel a greater sense of ownership, it’s a solid enough new chapter for a group who always kept it light, so why change all that much now?

It may not be perfect, or even great, but Pete Doherty has somewhat surprised with Hamburg Demonstrations by proving to a world increasingly less interested in his antics that, when given the chance, he can still pen a tune or two. Maybe just try including a few more 'bangers' in the next album Pete, eh.

The arena-filling sound that runs through modern music owes something to Bon Jovi, but This House… comes across more like their third-tier spiritual successors, comprised of forgettable dance-rock and schmaltzy slow-burners loaded with endless platitudes and those echoey, staccato guitar lines that bands do when they want to sound big.

The details rest comfortably in the background and add only to a sense of ambience, not to a bold artistic statement.

Highway Songs feels both like an underwhelming experiment with moments of greatness, as well as a highly personal piece which is almost impossible to penetrate.

Its great moments really are great, and shouldn’t be underestimated. However, when an album is bookended between two potential song of the year contenders with little to grasp in between, it’s difficult to really get too invested in this record.

The thing is I wanted a Pretenders album, not The Black Keys feat. Chrissie Hynde. Which is what this all too often feels like.

You really can’t get het up one way or another about a song like ‘Waste a Moment’, which might as well be called ‘Lead Single’, nor can you muster up anything other than a yawn as ‘Conversation Piece’ stretches out like a cat in front of a fire on a cold winter night.

It’s not terrible album--it might even make you do a little shoulder shimmy every now and then or remind you of an awesome Depeche Mode song you haven’t listened to in years, but at the end of it you’ll probably find yourself either: a) indifferently bored; b) making bets with yourself on what he’s going to channel next: will it be an oriental theme, a Cuban beat, a doo-wop harmony or will he go rogue with some balalaika? (He doesn’t.)