A second album that's brimming with pop hooks and instantly memorable choruses. [Apr 2018, p.96]

Clever and cool, Season High is a career high. [Jun 2017, p.90]

He's walking away on style, delivering a collection of distinctive songs. [Nov 2009, p.97]

This is a rariety--bright, soulful and (yes) clever pop. [Mar 2009, p.114]

Frank and redemptive, it's a journey of small Texas towns and wide open spaces. [Nov 2022, p.89]

It's a seductive lesson in understated beauty. [Apr 2012, p.86]

If midlife crisis haunts the 40-year-old Skinner, encroaching mortality is re-energised by juniors like neo-soul sister Greentea Peng's soporific vibrations on I Wish You Loved You As Much As You Love Him. [Aug 2020, p.93]

An unshamedly fun album. [Sep 2009, p.104]

Whether it improves on 2010's First Four EPs compilation is debateable. But as Morris would doubtless observe, 'progress' is but a bourgeois vanity. [Jul 2012, p.85]

This is a fine record, a real grower, but it also sees a group comfortably adrift. [Sep 2005, p.89]

Another mesmerising, profound, excellent record. [Jul 2023 p.86]

It's Holmes who provides the spark throughout Cypress Grove. [Feb 2020, p.94]

A short, dynamic return to form is similarly earwrenching. [Nov 2012, p.95]

Despite the lulls, the resistance to ending songs, Reflektor lets Arcade Fire shed expectations along with a skin, an act of rejuvenation few at their level manage with conviction. [Nov 2013, p.82]

This act of restoration convinces as a good Tony Joe White album that could have been plucked from anywhere during his career. [Jun 2021, p.80]

It's a generous and potent fix of Pollard eccentricity. [Apr 2018, p.94]

Buoyed with emotional heft and supernova guitar riffs, their second album is wired around a maturing songcraft and the studio savvy of grunge producer Butch Vig. [Aug 2008, p.112]

Against this highly contemporary but ever-wacko sonic backdrop, the Upsetter orates magisterially. [Sep 2008, p.98]

Joan Wasser's second covers set finds romance in Prince's lust-blind Kiss and innocence in the Strokes' Under Control. [Jul 2020, p.88]

A lugubrious but fresh, genre-bending take on modern club music. [Nov 2021, p.91]

A New York studio may not be the ideal place to summon up the atmosphere of the Wild West, but these desperadoes on Barry Adamson's lable make a pretty good fist of it. [Dec 2009, p.101]

The delivery is relentless. [Jun 2014, p.86]

[A] fine and discerningly lean album. [Sep 2016, p.93]

Their anarchic spirit is captured over the original LP's 11 tracks. [Sep 2015, p.92]

Though no Pet Sound, this album, at its best so wistfully reliving out golden yesterdays, ranks up there with Today! [Aug 2012, p.92]

A colourful, catchy and quietly impassioned record. [Oct 2016, p.90]

[A] gloriously sensual record. [Sep 2015, p.93]

The new approach... lets them explore their lyrical side. [Sep 2005, p.94]

Confident and expansive, yet intimate and subtle, Bonny Doon are in a good place here. [Aug 2023, p.81]

A set glorying in its sensual exoticism. [Jan 2007, p.102]

This pared-back sonic trip sings with freshness and immediacy. [Sep 2023, p.89]

Visitations may just be their finest half-hour. [Dec 2006, p.108]

Stylistic touchstones veer toward the William Blake's 7 weird of Julia Holter, Henry Cow and Julie Tippetts' prog-jazz outlier Sunset Glow. Incomprehensible/irresistible. [Sep 2023, p.87]

The strangely beautiful bounty of Mogadisco reveals more telling detail with each listen. [Feb 2020, p.103]

Impressively, he makes it all his own--at times it feels like the songs might have been written by, or for, him. [June 2008, p.115]

It exudes an organic, direct feel from which it gains its considerable charm. [Feb 2008, p.112]

These 10 compact songs work both as intimate affirmation of Jurado's current brilliance and a hushed elegy for his too-soon-departed friend. [Jun 2019, p.89]

A gloriously nuanced embellishment of the band's timeless virtue. [Apr 2015, p.91]

Those inimitable Laibach humours look set to endure. [Apr 2014, p.92]

Despite such flamboyant touches, the songs here are more caustic than camp. [Oct 2003, p.120]

Weiss weaves his way through a songbook that encompasses olde-tyme rock, jazz, R&B and Cajun sounds. [Jun 2014, p.90]

[A] polished second set by the Swedish '70s-inspired blues-psych outfit. [Sep 2016, p.99]

It's a noticeably urban record, an irritated rebuttal to the notion that dance music is dead. [Jun 2005, p.98]

Vibrant, vividly colourful and high spirited. [Jan 2006, p.146]

Louis Carnell crafts grime's own I Hear A New World. [Dec 2015, p.91]

Rich, understated and resonant. [Feb 2017, p.97]

It's hard to imagine a record more original or full of life, from any artist of any age, emerging this year. It's that damn good. [Nov 2007, p.91]

The quality dips and pitches, occasionally stuck at third on the bill at the Bill And Gate. There are tiny revelations too. [Mar 2016, p.104]

Kushal Gaya's vocal hooks bristle with political fury as polyrhythms jostle with George Crowley and Pete Wareham's brass riffs. [May 2020, p.95]

She gives each song an unforced intimacy. [Feb 2009, p.115]

Brainy, jazzy, prescient. [Aug 2021, p.88]

A brave, stand-alone release that lays her talent bare, it's a beautiful unreal entrancement you'll find hard to stop listening to again and again. [Dec 2023, p.91]

It's not much different (from their first album), and that's no bad thing with Holly Golightly and Lawyer Dave's self-produced duets recalling Leadbelly and Jimmy Reed, as well as the gospel recordings of Loretta Lynn and Nancy & Lee. [Nov 2008, p.109]

The swell and squall lets up just once, on the transcendental In A Cloud, but it's in the moments of pure sonic abandon, like Wilding, that the group truly find themselves. [Apr 2015, p.95]

The former Bedales pupil's steely vocals and ear for a big melody amidst the intricacy offer a unifying and satisfying undertow. [Feb 2024, p.88]

Despite the record's impromptu genesis, its results sound endearing. [Apr 2014, p.93]

Baroness's second full-length somehow tops their powerhouse debut for riffs, songwriting and cohesiveness. [Feb 2010, p. 101]

Ronson and Wainwright have dressed these songs to kill, not just to impress. [May 2012, p.84]

Should rightly have fans and newcomers alike punching the air in solidarity. [Nov 2021, p.88]

The likes of Beck and Stevie Nicks play supportive rather than starring roles, and the sonic flavours here recall the noir clubby pop of Humanz (2017). The woofer-pumping reggaeton of Tormenta however sees Albarn step aside to let Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny shine. [Mar 2023, p.85]

Unity Band is now a scintillating platform for Metheny's fretboard wizardry. [Aug 2012, p/94]

The main attraction of this six-disc box set reissue is a new ground-up stereo mix of Imagine by Paul Hicks at Abbey Road. These new mixes are clearer and more controlled, though respectful (maybe overly so). [Nov 2018, p.103]

Conjunto, corrido and jazz emerge from and mingle with R&B and pop as the band follow the story from innocent beginnings to the tragic, bitter end. [Jul 2005, p.98]

Pleasing as Trevor Horn's simpatico production on 2003's Dear Catastrophe Waitress was, Tony Hoffer has picked up the baton and ran with it, capitalising on the band's increased musical confidence while preserving vital hints of indie scuzz. [Feb 2006, p.92]

This latest doesn't noticeably monkey with their formula, and with good reason. [Dec 2015, p.93]

As ever, Heaton's whipsmart lyrics lurch between grumbling and lovesick, but he and Abbott bounce off each other like a couple who still relish being married. [Apr 2020, p.93]

The electronic treatments melt lusciously into the acoustic source material and only occasionally ... does dissonant incongruity intrude. [Aug. 2011, p. 106]

The climax of Tumast is a trance0drone masterpiece that the band would be foolish not to stretch to its limits in concert. Only closer Ma S-Abok suggests there is a comedown side to the Saharan psychedelia. [Apr 2018, p.93]

That Cambodian rock band with a repertoire of the most obscure covers have grown up--and no snakes were harmed in the making of this album.

Anaïs Mitchell with guitarist/singer Jefferson Hamer unexpectedly proves that her precious storytelling art is equally mesmerizing on the great traditional ballads collated in the 19th century by Francis James Child. [Mar 2013, p.96]

One tiny complaint: the original tapes were intended as complete listening experiences, immersive acts of prayer with transportive qualities of a religious or psychedelic experience. For the time being, this is just a taste of the full bewitching trip. [Jun 2017, p.102]

This time around, the Gizz's experiments have resulted in a compelling macrame of blues, rock, electronica, country and more besides. [Jun 2019, p.90]

Fugazi's signature edge duly emerges. [May 2020, p.86]

More cohesive, languid and countrified [than Floaters and October Song]. [Sep 2021, p.83]

There's a full band, a string section Swarmatron and brass. Reassuringly, the songs are strong enough to carry the new load. [Mar 2024, p.85]

Lord Steppington simultaneously engages the grey matter while snapping at the neck muscles. [Apr 2014, p.93]

This fourth record in six years is another gem, a touch rockier than 2011's saccharine Lollipop, but no less sublime. [May 2013, p.95]

Daniel conveys an expert melancholy. its ups always just on the brink of an elegant down. [Mar 2024, p.88]

Some of the most powerfully surging melodies from a British band since the second Travis album. [March 2002, p.114]

I've Been Trying to Tell You works wonderfully on many levels. Those harsh first impressions give way to something altogether more beautiful. [Oct 2021, p.94]

The resulting 10 songs are an intriguing genetic mix of modern psychedelia and eccentrioc pop. [Apr 2010, p.93]

While her impressively expansive band needs little bidding to cut loose, Carthy's lush vocals, and cryptic lyrics keep you on your toes. [Jun 2011, p.103]

A delicate, inward-facing set. [May 2024, p.80]

These are epic soundtracks for the lost adventurer within us all. [Jun 2014, p.91]

12 solo guitar pieces conjure spatial evocations. [Jan 2022, p.91]

Their latest warms the electronic pot with quirky pastoralism--brass, melodica, clattering-teacup percussion and tangible emotional warmth. [Oct 2018, p.94]

It benefits from producer Jim Sclavunos's emphasis on a place-you-in-the-room live approach, bringing the dark to labelmates Temples' light, as Heavenly's neo-psych vanguard marches onwards. [Nov 2016, p.94]

Colorado feels more focused than Pill, especially so the backing vocals. [Nov 2019, p.87]

Those attuned to the harsh aspects of existence, who despair at the forces shaping the world, won't find any answers as such, but Angels & Devils' blend of fever dreams and corporeal nightmare articulates the confusion beautifully and brutally. [Sep 2014, p.86]

Cooler Returns proves Kiwi Jr have the skills to match their smarts. [Feb 2021, p.86]

Josh conjures a light, affectless mood which quietly promises happiness without ever sliding into schmaltz. [May 2006, p.100]

A bold and celebratory affair. [Feb 2017, p.90]

Their second album is a delicate collection that welcomes you back into their magical world. [Mar 2018, p.95]

After a few spins its beautifully arranged songs get scratched into your soul. [Jun 2007, p.100]

Any sketchiness only adds to the impressionistic atmospheres that the musicians create. [Apr 2018, p.93]

It sounds as spare and intimate, as if Jurado were singing inside your head. The songs are up there with his best. [Jun 2020, p.91]

They really do sound like a band more than a group. [Jun 2019, p.92]

Consistently absorbing, as good as any of Foxx's early-'80's benchmarks. [Apr 2012, p.86]