An emotional ride that's hard to tune out. [22 Feb 2020, p.55]

Humanist finds former Exit Calm man Rob Marshall crafting a brooding songbook fuelled by echoing post-punk guitars, steely beats and electronic embellishments.

There’s life in the old dog yet, and what’s more he’s learned some new tricks, which can only be applauded at this point. Ordinary Man might end up being the full-stop on an extraordinary career. Let’s hope that’s not the case, but if it is, Ozzy is going out with as much fire and passion as he started with 50 years ago.

Often commercial and sometimes devoutly, intentionally un-commercial, Splid is a delightfully edgy album from a combustible unit that, here, sound as if they might blow at any second. Volatile, tuneful, raucous and unstable, it is the perfect rock’n’roll record from a genuinely unique band.

The music itself is minimalist, but still manages to conjure an intense darkness, aided by the haunting drawl of guitarist Reid Bateh. [15 Feb 2020, p.55]

It’s okay to not be okay, and Spanish Love Songs celebrate that with no small amount of knowing grouchiness here. The result is an album that’s not perfect – but those who get it will fall in love with it.

Frontman Tyler Connolly spends a little less time moping than previously, and throws in subjects such as domestic violence, racism and politics, but when the musical backing is this over-polished and ultimately mundane, it’s hard to care what he’s singing about.

Finding new ways to bring the heavy. [1 Feb 2020, p.55]

It’s a fun-packed, good-time brew, and if you’re looking to beat the January blues, Hurry Up And Wait’s party-starting fever is perfect.

The Texans still sound like a band capable of stealing hearts forever. [1 Feb 2020, p.55]

It's a hella mega good time from start to finish. [1 Feb 2020, p.53]

Arriving just at the right time for its message to feel truly resonant, Sorry For The Late Reply is a bold, brave, brilliant work.

10 tracks that are easily the weirdest, the boldest and – yes – most powerful material that the group have stuck their name on.

Occasionally, Thin Mind lacks the energy to truly achieve lift off, but maturity has given Wolf Parade room to roam. [11 Jan 2020, p.57]

As ever, the line between sincerity and mawkishness is down to the ear of the beholder, but maturity is creeping into Beach Slang’s songs of eternal punk rock youth, and here their bleeding heart is in the right place.

For every comparison you can make of individual moments, there is little here that you can honestly say you’ve heard before, and little that can be judged on traditional terms. But that’s what makes her such a fascinating force.

The rattling, almost post-rock cacophony that swirls around her, weaving in and out of chilling, eerily measured moments, makes for a spectacular, engulfing experience, too. [4 Apr 2019, p.71]

While it’s not a classic of the Corgan canon, it does feel like he’s enjoying himself immensely doing it. And we’re happy enough to hear that. [7 Dec 2019, p.53]

They’ve emerged as one of the most vital punk-fuelled bands of the age, and their live show is a huge part of that. Check this out to see why. [7 Dec 2019, p.54]

Blood Incantation have created a contender for death metal album of the year here.

It's intoxicating stuff. [2 Nov 2019, p.54]

Get The Money might not set the world ablaze like the rock bands to which it is clearly indebted, but it sounds like Taylor burning one while rocking on. Which means there’s still plenty here to put a smile on your face.

While Daemon is not without its evil edge, there's a bounciness to it that makes it an interesting and, oddly, occasionally fun listen. [2 Nov 2019, p.55]

It crucially all gels properly into something all of its own, rather than disparate parts that won't mix no matter how hard they're shaken. [26 Oct 2019, p.54]

What’s emerged is an exploration: of the heavenly and the primal, the savage and the beautiful, the ultimate mystery of what it actually is to be human.

This is hook-laden power-pop with one eye on the world's arenas. [4 Oct 2019, p.55]

Impassioned and intense, packed with killer riffs, compressed, barely-controlled energy and a driving sense of momentum. [19 Oct 2019, p.53]

Woeful radio-rock mess. ... On-point production work prevents Screamer from being an unmitigated disaster, but songwise it's as deep as a puddle. [19 Oct 2019, p.55]

The band's most accessible release for a long time, with two or three songs that could muscle in on a Greatest Hits. [5 Oct 2019, p.54]

Everything fizzes and bursts and explodes with neon delight that sounds, genuinely, like nothing else on earth, but has a delight to it that's oh so familiar. [5 Oct 2019, p.53]

Somebody's Knocking is undoubtedly a labour of love for its creator, and a joy for everybody else. [12 Oct 2019, p.55]

It's a pleasant enough record, but not one that will rouse or inspire beyond Dallas' already charmed following. [12 Oct 2019, p.55]

For those who like their rock adventurous, Easter may be cancelled, but Christmas has come early. [12 Oct 2019, p.55]

Eccentric in all the right ways, No Home Record is just poppy enough to be accessible, yet edgy enough to satisfy even the pickiest of old school noise-rock fans. [12 Oct 2019, p.55]

Here, nine of the 12 songs are Greg’s, and much of the album revels in his wistful romanticism as a result. ... Not that Hello Exile sits around navel-gazing. The Tom-led Last To Know is a seething rocker, and the just-audible off-mic yell before the guitar solo showcases a band as exuberant as ever, even as Joe Godino’s beats hammer down like a hangover.

Welcome Home is definitively a wonderful time, and a fitting farewell to an irreplaceable metal hero. [5 Oct 2019, p.55]

It’s a good album, though not an Opeth classic. It occasionally meanders and feels in need of a few more truly golden moments to tie its various eccentricities together into a brilliant whole.

On Nine it feels like the band are finding a new lease of life in the dark days of 2019. [4 Sep 2019, p.53]

Truthfulness and honesty [are] inherent throughout this fantastic record. [14 Sep 2019, p.55]

It is more a showcase of Korn's strengths when hard times do come along; harnessing their ability to inspire and energise even in the darkest and most difficult of circumstances. [14 Sep 2019, p.53]

Corpse Flower is an album for completists. [15 Sep 2019, p.55]

As good as Heavy Fire? Nope, but it's another superb shot of classic-spirited heavy rock from masters of their craft. [7 Sep 2019, p.55]

This is another modern classic from a classic band. [14 Sep 2019, p.55]

This is the work of a brilliant artist who is singular in both talent and vision. [14 Sep 2019, p.54]

Sounds as powerful as ever. A welcome return from a much-missed thrash battalion.

What's undeniable is that Ceremony's sixth album is packed with more memorable tunes than many bands can manage in a whole six albums. [31 Aug 2019, p.54]

It's hard to imagine a more enchanting soundtrack to the summer. [24 Aug 2019, p.55]

This is the most intricate and densely-layered album Tool have yet made, but to use the word like "complex" to describe the counting-in-prime-numbers time signatures of Invincible or digital-only track Legion Inoculant would be lazy in the extreme. ... An album that pushes and challenges its creators and its audiences in new ways, the finer details of which will probably take another 13 years to fully unwrap and appreciate. [24 Aug 2019, p.53]

Coming in cold, it’s another Killswitch Engage album – metal that punches and screams with an effectiveness and accuracy of attack that is ingrained from experts in their field doing their thing for a long time. But in knowing the journey of its creation, it gains a character and a level of emotion that would otherwise be absent.

There's a rare talent in being able to soundtrack a nightmare and put it to a catchy beat, but it's a skill in which this deadly duo have become absolute masters. [17 Aug 2019, p.55]

With Sparse arrangements and songs that are never less than smart, How Do You Love? is an album for lovers than fighters and for anyone with a little romance in their heart, this is a doozy. [17 Aug 2019, p.55]

Busy with songs that fizz with life and are packed with the kind of choruses that exist in a glorious, endless summer. [17 Aug 2019, p.55]

20 years since their debut, Slipknot are as bold, fearless and exhilarating as ever.

The push-pull between fragile piano and ruptures of psychic static is arresting, but by far Kristin’s most captivating weapon is her voice. ... It’s an awesome work of extreme beauty and brutality that will leave you speechless.

Volbeat still sound like a band desperately searching for an identity to call their own. [3 Aug 2019, p.59]

A superior collection from a genuinely superior group. [27 Jul 2019, p.56]

When it works, as it does particularly well on Should've and Doesn't Matter, the results are impressive. But Throughout, Falling is Never less than commendable. [27 Jul 2019, p.57]

Stories unfurl with an infectious nerdiness that undulates between giddy Boys’ Own exuberance and a museum curator’s painstaking attention to detail. [20 Jul 2019, p.57]

Taken as a whole, it’s the hardest and heaviest album they’ve ever made, and across its 10 tracks, it’s also Sum 41 at their most creative and willing to explore their frontiers.

There are numerous peaks on what might be Torche's finest album since 2008's Meanderthal. [20 Jul 2019, p.58]

The results will mostly appeal to completists. [13 Jul 2019, p.73]

The songs blurring together in a collision of lurching, down-tuned juddering riffs and electronics. ... Tedious. [6 Jul 2019, p.55]

Charming, likeable collection. [29 Jun 2019, p.56]

A powerful, if not quite life-changing set of songs. [8 Jun 2019, p.55]

Music born of despair has rarely been as exhilarating as this. [15 Jun 2019, p.55]

When Rise is good, it's a blast. However, like the boozy gang from which they take their name, there's a tendency toward excess. [22 Jun 2019, p.59]

It's so genuinely anti-social, abrasive and purposeful in its mission to turn you off that it's actually impressive. [25 May 2019, p.55]

A powerful and worthy addition to the band's increasingly diverse catalogue. [15 Jun 2019, p.55]

Kind Heaven is a beautifully conceived, exquisitely constructed and fully realised work of towering ambition. ... The perfect album to soundtrack the summer. [15 Jun 2019, p.54]

By trying to annihilate what's gone before and truly raise themselves higher, they've created a special record, with a depth that will still have you under its spell a decade from now. [15 Jun 2019, p.53]

This is smart, sexy and it rocks like a wild thing. When the Future Dust settles, The Amazons might just stand as a band worth all the hype and more.

The ebb and flow keep you constantly on your toes. [8 Jun 2019, p.55]

As a tribute, it is wonderful, but even without the terrible context in which the album has come about, Final Transmission is superb. [8 Jun 2019, p.54]

What Venom Prison have done is humanised this music by holding up a mirror to a cruel world and viewing people as more than simply walking dummies full of guts, but sentient beings worthy of life, rather than a grisly, gory death. In doing so, they’ve made something more powerful and worthy of your respect than a million meaningless blastbeats. [1 Jun 2019, p.53]

What YONAKA have made here is one of 2019’s best breakthrough rock albums. Put simply, Don’t Wait ‘Til Tomorrow is the birth of a new band of rock stars. [25 may 2019, p.54]

Country-fuelled it may be, rather than the expected full-pelt rock, but so open is this letter that it easily succeeds in transcending genres. [1 Jun 2019, p.53]

As an example of a band whose explosive energies are captured, rather than recorded, this is strong work. [1 Jun 2019, p.55]

Their confidence in holding back the fury also serves them well, not doing so just to make the heavier parts seem heavier, making the whole thing flow seamlessly, carrying Whitechapel almost effortlessly to the proverbial next level.

While Eternal Forward Motion is most definitely a record that sounds like it would spit in your face before punching you, this isn’t simply moping around. These lyrics have a very real meaning, written for the voiceless millions of disenfranchised youths, growing up into a shitshow of someone else’s making. [11 May 2019, p.53]

This is Earth in their purest form. ... This album is also a perfect introduction to Earth for curious neophytes. [25 May 2019, p.55]

A welcome and overdue return. [18 May 2019, p.55]

This is a record made with care, craft, and nothing allowed in that isn’t just-so. It may seem an odd thing to praise a band as flamboyant as this for, but Rammstein know the value of quality rather than quantity. When they deliver, they still deliver the best.

While these songs may lack the same kind of energetic rage that defined the band in their early years, they're still a formidable way of exposing truths and holding the powers that be to account. [4 May 2019, p.55]

High Crimes is both energetic and spontaneous. It sounds like its members had a ball making it, and that sense of unconstrained fun and creativity bleed through it brilliantly. [4 May 20129, p.53]

The 34-year-old may not quite have reached nirvana just yet, but in his personal quest for enlightenment he’s never sounded more optimistic about life’s possibilities. [26 Apr 2019, p.53]

Gloriously triumphant, weirdly exhilarating and entirely engrossing, Sunn O))) have created something genuinely brilliant here.

There's a middle-fingered severity that runs right through Sulphur English, knitting these different components into a coherent identity which can't be captured by portmanteau tags like blackened sludge or post-doom. [Apr 13, p.55]

Admittedly, the single-minded focus does get a bit repetitive, but Optimal Lifestyles makes for a defiantly fizzy soundtrack to growing old disgracefully. [6 Apr 2019, p.71]

There are a lot of records about the end of the world out there, vying for attention. This is one worth listening to. [6 Apr 2019, p.69]

Remaining as distinctive, unique and bloody brilliant as ever. [30 Mar 2019, p.55]

The result is a superb, invigorated record that invites you to wake up, as they have done, in a brave, bold and beautiful new world.

The quartet take songs that are not always wholly divorced from pop music and turn them into something weird and wild. [23 Mar 2019, p.55]

American Football have matured, but what remains unchanged is their ability to gently tug the heartstrings. [23 Mar 2019, p.55]

Those familiar with the band will be unsurprised that it’s an intense, at times overwhelming listen. ... Panorama is another outstanding release from a truly special band.

It's a sideways step for this pair, then, but not so much a complete mutation as trying on a new, synth-tastic set of clothes. [16 Mar 2019, p.55]

It feels like there's not much tread left on the tyres, although the speaker-thumping production of Hexed make it a cut above 2015's I Worship Chaos. [9 Mar 2019, p.55]

On tracks like Can't Knock The Hustle, Piece Of Cake and High As A Kite, the smartness and deceptive simplicity is lost under a wash of electronic beats and un-catchy melodies. ... They sound boring. [23 Feb 2019, p.54]

Sacrificing none of that trademark musicianship, this is Dream Theater at their most accessible, and they lose nothing for it. [23 Feb 2019, p.55]