Instead of collapsing under any pressures with his new band, Mercer enthusiastically pushes back with this album, shrugging off any doubt that he is done reinventing himself as an artist.

This is beautiful stuff and my favourite yet from Deepchord.

Starmaker is a world unbound by time and gravity, a fantasy borne of solar winds. If this is where country music is headed, we should all be so lucky to be invited along for the journey.

That's part of what makes Sorry 2 so much fun: it's inconsistent, flailing and completely unpredictable.

Between its laid-back vocals, surf guitar and stomping percussion, Born Under Saturn makes a strong claim to being your ideal beach or road trip companion this summer.

Handling the production duties on What's Between is the Haxan Cloak, whose own cavernous soundscapes are perhaps the most metal thing in electronic music these days. The pairing is apt and the results are fantastic.

There is a comprehensive exploration of musical avenues and ideas, as well as a pleasing juxtaposition of an overarching concept and sound design.

Styles finally sounds at home in his role as a pop megastar. Settling in nicely on Harry's House, he manages to hit a sweet spot in between One Direction breakout star and modern-day rocker.

TOPS like to keep listeners on their toes. Their music is undeniably beautiful and, for all its subtleties, often immediately rewarding.

Swapping out the distressed warning signal that slides in midway through with shrill synths that run the rest of the song, the adaptations across Woman Worldwide offer a live experience without the cost of admission, and a well-crafted look at some of Justice's best.

Ultimately, variety is good for the album, but here's the thing: Martha's own songs can be completely riveting.

Warm Chris is neither refined nor contained: it wanders and wonders, affirming the sheer joy of curiosity.

Moh Lhean is a stellar album that serves as a portrait of the artist as a not-quite-so-young man who's still finding weird new ways to pose age-old questions.

The diversity of Future Brown never once feels overwhelming, making the trip through these sounds from a futuristic dance floor satisfying throughout.

Sol Invictus isn't perfect, and it's not their best work, but Faith No More creaking with a little rust and blinking cobwebs is still a glorious thing.

The album doesn't quite match their punishing live show, but neither does it betray their purpose or message: to fiercely silence the white noise of psychosocial oppression. It is one missive they convey without ambiguity.

Stormzy finds balance on This Is What I Mean and delivers a record with clear intentions and messaging. While it's unlikely to please the entirety of his audience, those who find this record in the pits of depression, lost spirituality, heartbreak or falling in and out of love will undoubtedly be moved.

An album that is layered and diverse in its sound palette and execution, with something for appreciators of the many different flavours electronic music has to offer.

This is her best album yet.

[An] explosive and emotional debut.

Isolation works because Uchis displays impeccable command over her voice and her style. She bends genres to her will rather than allowing them to absorb her identity, making for an impressive effort that will only improve as it ages.

While her debut featured plenty of catchy tunes, Sees the Light captures Goodman in a far more confident mode, showcasing her wit and personality.

Final Transmission feels like an intimate farewell letter to a lost friend, and a fitting tribute to former bass player Caleb Scofield.

Although Sprinter is a singular vision, it won't help rid her of the PJ Harvey comparisons, proving Torres to be musician unafraid of comparison, but even less afraid of compromise.

The album is riddled with feeling, and there is an adamant sense of joy.

On Memento Mori, Depeche Mode turn this philosophical reminder into a beautiful, raw, and passionate rebirth.

Uptempo or down, Shane's performances were maximum R&B before the term was coined.

The album can so ricochet because of Folick's sprawling vocal range, which can quiver at atmospheric, Sinead O'Connor altitudes only to plummet into St. Vincent growls and skips.

Tying ambient soundscapes, borderline IDM and subtle snapshots of traditional music into a coherent, yet distinctive, body of work, this auspicious debut forecasts a promising future for Yu Su. Anyone would be happy to hop in a boat and sail these waters for hours and hours.

A tight 12 tracks that show the artist at his most approachable, romantic and optimistic.

With subtle rhythms and interesting melodies, In The Magic Hour delivers both lightness and depth in one hauntingly beautiful recording.

An even stronger effort, one that avoids the sometimes-frantic pace that marred that earlier album a little.

All in all, The Now Now feels fresh and present. Gorillaz have performed a type of sonic reset by stripping back their cast of collaborators, yet it exemplifies the strength of the songwriting at the group's core.

By shedding any cool pretence and steering directly into the skid of adult alternative cheese, the Killers have followed a lifetime of perfect songs and made their first truly great album.

For as often as Impersonator threatens to dishearten, it's anchored by an equal and opposite force: a humanity so earthbound and maternal that it washes away your petty sorrows in a birdbath of optimism.

On Talk Memory, BADBADNOTGOOD find likeminded collaborators ready to challenge and compliment them at every turn, resulting in a new evolution for the trio.

Maribou State's new LP delivers a musical mosaic that stays true to the roots of downtempo, while exploring new ground through diverse influences and styles.

µ20 gives this now-classic label the classy tribute it deserves.

On Amatssou, Tinariwen adds to their amazing range and melodic flexibilities through collaboration, allowing some of their biggest admirers into their majestic, fully realized world.

McCombs tries on many different hats, but has the skill to produce mostly positive results.

ARTPOP is a dynamic, memorable album that, while it fails to unveil the girl behind the aura, reveals a performer who finally sounds as invested in her art as she is in her image.

The album accomplishes what Psutka set out to do, which was to convey the dichotomy of club music through a minimalist and deconstructionist lens, and it does so unapologetically and with considerable confidence.

Straightforward and simple, A Eulogy for the Damned isn't a work of great musical genius, but is refreshing in its bravado and simplicity.

A kaleidoscope of wonder, moments tucked inside other moments like Russian nesting dolls.

With a staggering 18 songs, Vessel may appear daunting at first, but quickly proves itself to be a sharp and smooth listen.

Virtue is as fun as it is challenging and is both catchy and complex.

While Barnes is definitely well-versed in musical melancholy, there's also a thoughtful, sensitive part to balance all this pathos.

Power manages to keep Dumb Flesh sounding uniform and digestible, a great feat for an artist hell-bent on dissecting his craft.

True Love is a loving snapshot of what Hovvdy holds dear in the present and their excitement for the future is infectious. Instead of reflecting on the past and easiness of simpler times, they are finding pockets of these hyper-elated feelings in the here and now.

It all taps deeply into different veins of pop, yet it's gloriously synergetic in the incredible world created by Prince Rama.

Joke in the Hole is undoubtedly Eric Copeland's strongest release, a cycle of songs that brazenly possess both structural maturity and childlike weirdness.

They're the kind of songs you pull out once a month as reassurance that the mundanity of normal life can be beautiful, and/or we are all in this together. That's true today and it will be true tomorrow.

Like your favourite beer, Municipal Waste are reliable and will whet your whistle for thrash, a comparison the band would welcome with arms, or mouths, wide open.

Harder, better, faster and stronger than their excellent debut, 2009's Post Nothing.

Cantus, Descant is accessible without ever feeling thoughtless, plays to Davachi's sonic strengths, and provides just enough experimentation and variety to justify its daunting running time. It's a journey worth taking.

The King of Whys is wrought with restless artistry, simultaneously looking for and finding emotional release through musical exploration, lyrical introspection and bits of dry humour.

Dreams Worth More Than Money overflows with sonic effervescence, drawing you into the snake pit that is the mainstream hip-hop industry, with all the opulent trappings therein. Tight production support ingenious raps that continue to push the envelope of the street anthem narrative.

It only takes a few spins to detach oneself from the hype and respect the admirable groundwork laid down here for future greatness.

Built on a fuzzy foundation, II is as classic as a psychedelic-stoner-rock record can be, building on well-loved tropes but never hesitant to colour outside the lines.

As usual, fascinating choices abound when a lost Bob Dylan session is unearthed (and, excitingly, signalling that maybe there's way more of this kind of stuff to come), but this one feels particularly prototypical and casual, and, with good humour, was intended to warm folks up — to each other and the material — more than get its hypothetical audience hot and bothered.

Hell Can Wait succeeds as a reintroduction of sorts, showing Staples as a more focused and forward-moving artist who will surely outlive "them red roses."

This brilliant light on the country's folk music scene has never sounded better.

With each album they add more to their story, and the underlying emotional connection to the band and their songs is what grows in intensity.

Nine albums into their career, Animal Collective continue to deliver records far ahead of their time.

Though highly unlikely to unseat Hometowns or Departing as fan favourites, The Wild follows in the footsteps of the band's previous album, Mended with Gold, as a very strong album that doesn't yet hold the same sentimental value as their earlier material.

A lot of Aphex EPs are marred by fairly forgettable tracks (who's blasting "Nannou" in 2023?), but this latest one is solid tungsten all the way through.

Courageous and passionate, Bada$$ is a well-timed soundtrack to social and political struggle. While the album specifically chronicles the horrors of being a young black man in America, Joey articulates his angst in a way that easily resonates with anyone stumbling under the weight of oppression.

With their traditional sound mixing well with some new elements, Utilitarian marks the next chapter in Napalm Death's impressive career.

Harris is a sage escort to have along for the ride, and with the spare concrete signifiers and evocative open spaces she provides on Grid of Points, she's crafted a map for the full spectrum of human emotions and experiences.

GRIP is more than just a showcase for the return of Black queer spaces. It’s a celebration of the relationships — passionate, platonic, lasting, fleeting, loving, lustful — that these spaces foster.

Throughout Dawn, she exhibits wit and exemplary control and the blurred genre lines on the album are her playground.

Trouble Will Find Me burns slowly, but melds together more seamlessly with each listen.

A powerful return to form.

By KiCK iiiii, we are in truly subdued territory. An avant-classical journey into quieter realms, it privileges instrumental detail and tender lyricism over rhythmic intensity.

Taken as a whole, this is the kind of record that will infect your life, to paraphrase "Sepsis," one of the record's standouts. I, for one, am down to let it kill me.

Monument Building finds Loscil at his most focused, political and meticulous, a bleak but fulfilling listen whether you're aware of the album's brainy themes or not.

This ranks amongst Gelb's most vital albums in an already storied career.

Electric Lady Sessions perhaps best functions as the defining calling card of a post-reunion LCD Soundsystem.

Totally original, completely unselfconscious and wonderfully catchy, WINK is one of those rare albums that you can throw on anytime and let it guide you on the journey it has laid out before you.

A few duds like the repetitive "Glow Up" and the sappy duet with Prince Charlez "Smile" aside, Strength Of A Woman is Blige's finest offering in over a decade.

Steffi's transitions on Panorama Bar 05 sound smooth enough that they turn a mix listener's typical consideration of song blends towards the complementary selection of plunging machine sounds, naturalized in Panorama Bar 05 upon the steps of an ascendant, emotive trajectory.

Lily's clean and refined songwriting on Big Picture has her following in the footsteps of the similarly polished and venerable Laura Marling while sharing an emotionally intuitive sharpness and tongue-in-cheek propensity with fellow contemporaries like Lucy Dacus and Phoebe Bridgers.

He shines without any features, standing strong in his delivery and carrying his story to the forefront of the 13-track project.

The Chats say they don't try too hard while writing lyrics, but in this case, the simpler and less ambiguous the better. High Risk Behaviour is a slam to the skull with each stomp of the kick drum.

Despite the abundance of compositional ideas, they are all executed with attention to clarity, cohesion and detail. Thackray's auteurist approach in the studio combined with her peerless precision and control feel like a whole new genre unto itself.

Blais' playing suits very well the pristine and glossy production Silver employed for those recordings, injecting it with a real sense of purpose here.

A daring and decadent series of witch rituals, The Eldritch Dark is one of the finest examples of the doomy occult-rock resurgence.

Think Burial operating on a slower, divergence-filled soundscape.

Short on hooks and obviously memorable moments, Songs You Make At Night is an album that excels in texture and dynamics instead, each thoughtfully composed song an intricate clockwork of whirring percussion and interlocking guitar and synth work.

KICK ii manages symmetry and catchiness despite its descents into the bizarre. ... But for all her experimentation and chaotic tangents, it is clear in KICK ii that she is acutely aware of the balance necessary to build a bop.

At its best, Relatives in Descent makes guitar music feel radical again, capturing both timely and timeless anxieties.

To the Happy Few doesn't feature many standout songs, but as a whole, it's a remarkably cohesive, often unpredictable piece of work.

With this EP, Krug demonstrates that less is more, but that it also doesn't hurt to go big, even if "big" in this case is an expertly timed digital synth here and there.

This is eclectic, bold, inventive, masterfully played music conceived with a refreshing sense of curiosity and wonder at the potential of sound to invigorate the spirit. Fans of BADBADNOTGOOD should cue up to have their minds blown by this profoundly deep fusion of jazz, world music and hip-hop sensibilities.

Rajan successfully bridges vintage influences into the best of modern psychedelia, resulting in the most precise and mature Night Beats album to date. Perhaps the secret ingredient is just a little hot ghee.

Moaning establish their sound while dodging redundancy on their debut.

Unlike some of Will Oldham's previous collaborative albums, this one really works.

The payoffs on Kveikur aren't immediate, but they're no less orchestrated than previous work, coming across like a more focused and fleshed out Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra with sweeter vocals.