There are moments of dynamism, like the excellent quivering steppers’ bassline in ‘Time’, or ‘In’’s disemboweled grime-pulse sounds. But even these tracks feel weighed down by a relentless paranoiac mood that soon begins to tire, their gestures sparse and restrained in a manner that’s presumably meant to be evocative, but often just feels unadventurous.

It’s a shame that their debut album is so short on variety and surprises, and doesn’t capture the imagination past a couple of listens.

Nobody's denying Herndon's ambition and technical chops, but the goals of this album--however successfully they might be achieved--are often unappealing; the sonic outcomes, regrettably, a little dull.

By taking electronic to mean, largely, removed introspection, WIXIX might be the one example of a guitar band who, by fully embracing electronica, have regressed.

If anything, they illuminate an increasingly formulaic approach that, in its attempt to express extremes of human emotion, ends up saying not very much at all.

While the lyrical content can be a little prescriptive in places, all of Womack's contributions are frank, honest and humble

It all comes across as fairly overwrought, working very hard to sound effortless and losing its sense of self in the process.

Even if his chops as a producer aren’t in question, the writing on Xen is too patchy to fully realise Ghersi’s ambitions. Still, it’s hardly lacking in ideas.

Aside from anything, the album’s glut of southern coke-rap cuts are plain mundane; partly because trap is so horribly over-exposed right now, and partly because footwork sounds unordinary next to any genre you could name.

In Our Heads seems acutely lacking in personality, meaning or the ability to evoke, in your head, anything other than a vague urge to dance.

The album wants to be eccentric, but it severely lacks personality.

This is a Chinese whispers record, one that has been passed through enough cultural and aesthetic filters as to make it utterly meaningless.

At the moment, it feels like he's clinging tenaciously to the edge of disco's seamy grandeur: held there by a certain stiffness, seriousness even.

It’s all genre-splicing and too little genre-defining, and I can’t help but think that Martyn, with both his musical knowledge and his production chops, is capable of something better.

There’s often a disconnect between the production and what’s going on vocally, the two elements at times even working at cross purposes.

It’s a creditable enough compilation as a whole, although a couple of relative oldies, Burial’s ‘Shell Of Light’ (from 2007’s Untrue) and DJ Rashad’s ‘Only One’ (from last year’s Double Cup) rather make me question the aims of the exercise.

It’s Too Late is a woozy, scattershot thing--Late Night Drake, if you will.

Having been born of time around Hot Chip's main activities, however, New Build's debut is not without the limitations that are likely of such an endeavour.

The problem is that the vocals sound generic.

Unfortunately, dependable lounge ambience this ain’t; as the album progresses, any sense of cohesion or purpose is quickly lost to the sheer density and variety of ideas.

There is some meat here, but it’s difficult to suck it off the bone. Perhaps in his efforts to prevent his music being “reified,” Warwick has fallen short of saying anything much at all.

At.Long.Last.A$AP is an unfocused, overlong slog of an album.

Lucifer is a very pleasant listen, but then so are The Wailers, without Bob.

Produced by arena rock specialists Flood and Alan Moulder, Holy Fire sounds pop sound insofar as it’s smoothed off, big and accessible.

Kwes is a resourceful, competent producer and songwriter who’s not short on ideas; if anything, he’s overwhelmed by his own creativity.

Hive Mind doesn't quite possess the same strength as what has preceded it.

It's as if by having every tool and style of every era and nation available to them at the press of a button has stripped AC's world of its mystery; as if there's nothing more to discover.

By and large, Overjoyed works when it rocks--the snarling chugga-chugga of “Do It Nation”, the nursery-rhyme feedback shredding of “Overjoyed And Thankful”--and falls a little flat when it doesn’t.