Though Hiss Spun probably won't end up as the best of her career, it may well be Wolfe's best so far.

So rather than the fanciful frippery it could so easily have been, The Moths Are Real is instead a fitting document of real life in all its mixed-up glory.

Maximum Balloon really about a great producer/songwriter exhibiting his considerable talents free from the pressure and expectation of his day job.

Take the receipt and lose it--you won’t be returning this record anytime soon.

This is the organic culmination of our protagonist’s most singular travels, and he’s reached a most puzzling bliss.

It is unmistakeably A Place To Bury Strangers and they're giving us what we want. The only additional complaint is that there's not enough of it.

This ultimately is Untogether’s crowning victory: despite being mapped by its lack of psychological surroundings, this firmly inward-looking record transports you head-first to Blue Hawaii’s special place, a serene vista where alien syllabic whimsy feels genuinely spiritual, and fuck-giving is most strictly forbidden.

There are few traces of the musician Cooke has presented himself as previously, but if this is how he wants to strike out on his own, the comparisons to his other bands should be incredibly short lived.

This is a hard, dark, inventive record that strongly suggests that give or take an imaginary sister and some fiddles, Jack White is pretty much the same boy we've always known.

The most sophisicated, deliciously out of step pop album of 2004.

The best love songs are the ones that make you want to dance and cry all at once; and Bad Love has them in spades.

Skits and the odd miss accepted, and the Anonymous Nobody… is a grand achievement. Regardless of whether their next project requires outsourced funding or not, De La Soul fans worldwide will just be happy if the group can keep up these standards while never forgoing their wayfaring creativity.

These songs rest quite naturally between the forlorn, heartbroken ballads, making this an album of exceptional and understated maturity and beauty. Sadness has rarely felt this good.

The queasy electronic work on Punk Drunk and Trembling, though, feels fresh, like the breaking of new ground, and you can say the same for ‘Maze’, with Tom Fleming’s baritone floating over an undulating bed of synths.

This is all Broken Boy Soldiers was ever meant to be: an off-the-cuff collaboration between two friends and one which, despite its imperfections, is an effort worthy of applause.

Although the themes in the album vary hugely--uncertainty, fear, hope, regret--the quality and confidence of the music is consistent.

It's predominantly a reflection, a look at things moving slowly and a stirring listen.

The 'odds and ends' packaged at the end of disc one feel like Jay Farrar’s discarded solo off-cuts, although disc two’s collection of demos is an intriguing listen; the ten tracks from the Not Forever, Just For Now tapes being what persuaded Rockville (then Giant) to sign them in the first place.

All of the time, Will Roan's vocal proves to be the most engaging aspect of Rewild, even at its least explosive.

Never before has a band name been more aptly descriptive of their music.

Like Muse, Mew fly in the face of the zeitgeist, cultivating a devoted following all the while. It’s one that should be sated (and in an ideal world, expanded) no end by No More Stories.

Middleton has made a dance record for the disenfranchised, oh sure it's a cliché, but Summer of '13 is one of the most refreshing things you hear all year. Come on you miserable bastards, this here is the soundtrack to your summer of '16.

A resolutely minor key offering, it’s even less instantly gratifying than before, precipitating its one central flaw: that these songs unfold at a leisurely pace – growing in stature as they progress from unassuming beginnings to sweeping crescendo – is admirable, but a touch overwhelming; even a little daunting on first exposure.

The accomplished sonic collages of Howlin' finely balance Jagwar Ma's influences and in doing so transcends into something singularly thrilling and cohesive.

Overall, you can still expect the same and more from Guster on this very summery record: tempo changes that will catch you off your guard, melodies that will stay in your head forever, and lyrics that may seem simple, but actually go deeper into life than you originally thought they did.

It is beautiful, ethereal and organic, breathing with life and is as far removed from the clean overly produced dance music which he holds in such distain. It has been a long wait, but on this showing it has certainly been worth it.

It's immensely listenable throughout, but at its best--with 'Vistate' and 'Cara Falsa'--it's truly spellbinding.

In its ability to appeal to so many listeners, while being as thrilling on its first spin as it is on its fifteenth, Art Angels is likely to emerge from 2015 as one of the most universally adored albums of the year.

There’s a rawness to this record that most new bands – sorry, most bands made up of new musicians – would do well to soak up.

Attack Decay Sustain Release defies such trite categorization and, ultimately, what it is or isn’t doesn't really matter. All you need to know is this is quality.

Rather than thinking of Groove Denied as some form of outlier we should only be thinking of it for what it is: a delicious treat.

All My Relations isn’t a replacement for a brand new Lightning Bolt album, the last one of which dropped in 2009, but it scratches many of those itches, while also fully justifying existence on its own terms.

Frantic and calculatedly assured.

As such, Limbo, Panto is shocking, funny, and above all irrevocable. Expect this lot to be around for the long haul.

Throughout, Sitek’s production dusts the stark techno basslines and percussion with ambient touches, and renders them human again, embellishing with swathes of guitars and treated synths, and allowing the vocals to come to the surface; untreated and clear as glass.

The 13 songs on Six are rich and exquisitely constructed, perfectly-pitched baroque riffs and orchestration are juxtaposed with searingly compelling lyrical imagery.

The melodies are polymerous, and Hauff’s deft technical flourishes mean that different instruments merge in and out of each other to create ever changing, but constant patterns.

Jeff Bridges might not be the actor's most emotional performance - to see that you need to watch the last five minutes of Fearless - but it is a surprisingly heartfelt piece of work, packed with enough hooks and harmonies to show he's obviously a keen student of the greats.

Possible Dust Clouds finds Kristin Hersh as artistically curious and inventive as ever. Committed to avoiding easy choices musically and lyrically, she remains intent on exploring the murky complexities of the mind and continuing to make the best work of her career. She is an artist that’s always evolving, and yet again the results are often dazzling and always fantastically bewildering.

It's an album peppered by moments of brilliance and not held back by its few brave failures and one that no one can have reasonably expected the talented quartet to have come up with.

In spite of all of this [still packed with his slow tempos, slurred sadness, and dour imagery], Grass, Branch and Bone stands as one of the easiest to inhabit of all of Joyner’s albums. Happily, it’s also as rewarding to explore as anything he’s done.

It is a formidably layered, beautiful record that largely lacks big hooks or aggressive bite, and yet conspires to be endlessly satisfying on a micro level, a clutch of ballads that represent the band's most intricate musical trip.

As a whole, it’s a 3 [out of 5], but the first two tracks are worth the extra point.

Seems Unfair not only trumps No One's Coming for Us lyrically, but musically too. Yes the comparisons for Waxahatchee are still there, but now Jones feels more comfortable and confident with his style of song writing and is starting to come into his own.

Simple, patient, dreary (in a good way) music dominates this soundtrack, providing the perfect accompaniment for Sheff to wail off about doctor and patient sex in a shrink office, society’s pervasive attraction to celebrity and the plights of aging, among other topics.

Here's a record that shows an innovative appropriation of sound that makes for one of the most exhilarating and original albums he's ever done.

Throughout Heartworms, Mercer and company prove that their sparse output is well worth the wait. The totality of the record is enough to engulf listeners in myriad textures accomplished via sound and vision.

This album has its dancing shoes straddling very different musical camps and somehow manages to bind them together with skill and personality.

This collection provides years of Beach Boys fun and suitably celebrates their 50 years.

99 Cents doesn’t exactly deliver the discussion on commodity and the self promised on the cover. But Santigold have assembled a fine package, one which showcases White and her undeniable swagger.

Fleet Foxes doesn't leave the stereo. Three, four, five times through-–these songs resonate over and over until they stick for good. A sign of a great record: words fail but a feeling remains.

Space Ducks is a must have for fans, and a superb introduction for those unfamiliar with his work.

The production is progressive, but not difficult; the mixture of sampled melodies and live instrumentation gives the whole record a submarine clarity and (as with many Anticon releases) the more listens the listener gives, the more content the album returns.

While the concept of a double album can be off–putting for some, these records shift and weave so seamlessly that one barely notices the combined one hr 30 runtime. That said, it is a record that rewards repeat listens, as its length and depth are well worth letting wash over you.

It shows an artist no longer caught in his own artistic web, but someone watching his past selves struggle from a higher vantage point.

Drums & Guns is likely to split opinion to a greater extent than any other piece of Low's extensive catalogue, but avid fans should not be put off as behind the challenging production and at the centre of all their controlled experimentation lies one of the band’s strongest releases to date.

Blackstar sees him and his band nail a haunting mood.

The amalgam of Clark's one-of-a-kind vocal and Toydrum's inventive soundscaping would, under normal circumstances have Evangelist marked out as a modern classic.

The Hamilton, Canada-based songstress has creamed together her best set yet. In Asking For Flowers, Edwards is uncompromising, but sombre.

Clever, joyous and never patronising, O is a half hour bite of summer that’s perfect for fending off the darkening nights.

The risks that Damien Jurado and producer Richard Swift take on Maraqopa are small and subtle adjustments to those already made on Saint Bartlett, but they are small steps which reap exquisite rewards for the listener.

In many ways, Outer South feels almost like a coming of age for Oberst. His voice is way stronger than it has been in the past.

Although it falls a few steps shy of wowing unreservedly, The Knot remains a poised and compelling second album.

Not everything is as memorable as everything else and there are a few tracks which perhaps have a tendency to meander a bit too long, but these do not take away from the overall feel of the album, more just drift off into space as is the predominant feeling of the two records.

It’s not a pretty record; while of course, being at times a very pretty record.

The best British debut since Oasis? Definitely... maybe. But one of the albums of the year? Without doubt.

Lotta Sea Lice won’t totally slake the thirst of the pair’s individual fanbases for new solo work, but what it does do is see them bring out the best in each other. It’s a powerful testament to the possibilities offered up by a genuine creative friendship.

Future Politics is political, danceable, dark, shimmering and hopeful. Not a combination easily achievable, but Austra have never been a normal band. Utopia might be fiction, but Future Politics is real, beautiful, necessary.

Koloss, however, is a real triumph of its genre: inventive, surprising, pleasingly punchy, unashamedly aggressive with just enough shade, tone and melody to balance the raucous but impressive production.

Frost has ditched much of the subtlety and minimalism that echoed within his previous work and birthed a surging, hard charging, straight to the rim, go-hard-in-the-paint beast of an album.

The overall effect is intoxicating -- some sort of triangulated point in the middle of REM, New Order and Statistics.

Whatever the case, Adore Life still feels like a step forward, not because it’s different, but because it’s more so.

Despite being the unmistakable sound of Beirut, this is not the "Orkestar" extension so widely expected. Rather than congesting the listener with frantic Eastern European folk shanties, a poignant nobility and romantic notion of contemporary France permeates its way into your conscience with unbridled zeal.

Ultimately, there is a familiarity to In Mind which for some may seem a little too much of the same from this now 'veteran' band, but as with every Real Estate record, their collective ears for little surprising turns and touches in amongst their overall pleasing sound, is still impressive, eight years on.

Although Stage Whisper comprises very much atypical pieces of music from Gainsbourg, it's still equally as lovable and interesting as her other works.

Here Panda retreats to inscrutable, heavenly distance, and while force of emotion might not suit an album whose foundations are laid on force of sound, I still find myself wishing he'd fully explore his more human side someday.

Travis may have reached the kind heights where each new release is instantly dismissed by many as more disposable, daytime-radio fodder, but '12 Memories' is easily the best post-'Rush Of Blood…' soft-rock record there is.

Indeed with such a raging fire burning through their bellies, this stands up alongside 60 Second Wipe Out as possibly Atari Teenage Riot's most potent collection of songs to date, and what's more, in a climate besieged with apathy and despondence, their relevance today cannot be underestimated.

This is music to be experienced, not read about or analyzed for political and sociological meanings.

Highly Deadly Black Tarantula is, then, not quite the beast that its title suggests. It’s more elusive than that.

On Life, Friel doesn’t venture too far from his own post, but does prove himself yet again as more than a mere dial-twiddler, a virtual dungeon master that plots campaigns with sound instead of words.

Only rarely is one privileged to be carried away by a record so beautifully absorbed with its own vision.

Even when 03/07 – 09/07 seems too cute or too pussy it’s still kind of heartening. Sincere environmentalism isn’t the sort of thing the ironic, narcissistic hipster hordes usually go for, so High Places must be doing something right, right?

On Art in the Age of Automation they are back to their best and clearly enjoying this newfound vigour for their craft.

Sugar Daddy Live reveals a picture of a storied band that is still finding ways to reinvent itself.

Playing to their strengths at last, they've taken the lustre of their energetic live shows and injected into their second record with an enthusiasm that shines out of every song.

It's all tension and release, with barely a second wasted to gasp for air amidst the squall of a band on invigorating form.

Patricia Hall and Ian Hicks have found the perfect balance between the moody and the danceable, making the whole home clubbing experience all the more realistic.

ken’s a grower. It’s not going to immediately colonise one’s affections in the way the best Destroyer records do, but it will slowly get there, even if some will immediately dismiss it as a supposedly 'weak entry' in the Destroyer catalogue.

If Transcendental Youth is the best thing Darnielle's ever done, it's only because it's about five per cent tighter and better-played.

All in all, Crooked Shadows is where new and old Dashboard meet amicably. It is the most revitalising DC album to date.

It caps it all off to be as blunt, open and insightful as you would expect from someone you're now on first name terms with.

Viet Cong's volatile brew often coalesces into something disarmingly catchy.

It’s the sound of Chuck Schultz’s Peanuts, dusky ‘70s Californian sunsets and the sound of a talent transcending her artistic straitjacket. Here’s to volume two.

Knoxville goes some way towards capturing the evident chemistry they found together, whilst also making it clear that we really need to catch them live to experience the full effect.

It's idea after idea after idea, and though TVOTR comparisons are as inevitable as they are fair, billing BLK JKS as the Brooklynite's more giddy cousins is perhaps a little off the mark: better to say both bands tap into the same ultra-distinct vein of murky sonic magic.

It’s the unmistakable sound of a band comfortable with having discovered that quiet is just in their character, and that those with the quietest voices can still cut through the squall.

This album is anything but a fad. It hangs around long after you listen, subdued but resolute in its capabilities. It is very much here to stay.