While at times ¿Cómo Te Llama? might feel as though it's fallen through a timewarp from the late 60s/early 70s, it's not afraid to jump around within this, from raw garage rock to deeper, darker blues.

If you get past the fact that CBV aren’t trying to be radical or cutting edge, or even particularly contemporary, you’ll find a pleasantly undemanding, chilled-out record that’s the perfect soundtrack for all those warm summer evenings we’re crossing our fingers for at the moment.

Once again this is a thought provoking and stimulating listen from Squarepusher, continually developing his style and surprising in his lightness of touch and inclusion of Latin and funk influences.

While a good half of the album demonstrates a genuine songwriting nous, other elements hint at a mere rehashing of old Suede ideas. More's the pity, as the opening three tracks alone are worth the price of admission.

With their second album The Drums are more absorbing than ever, and have created a record that will last far longer than their first.

An uncomplicated and perfectly pleasant record, swirling with some instantly intoxicating '60s inspired pop numbers, Lights Out finds itself running at the same, ultimately tedious pace for 12 songs.

Preacher’s Sigh & Potion finds Dear mostly content with spinning his wheels, but luckily his unique style and vocal delivery make it an enjoyable spinning.

For such an experimental band maybe they could have pushed these remixes further instead of into a no-man's land of accessible. For Battles, this is unchallenging territory.

This is an album that celebrates OMD's electric romanticism as purely as ever, with occasional concessions to house music developments made in a way that flatters their own work, part of an impressive desire to keep their original aesthetic . In that respect, it represents a qualified triumph.

It's a wallflower of an album, pretty, nice, but lacking the inspiration needed to lift it beyond the mundane.

None of it stops you longing after the energy and charm of their debut.

A thoroughly decent album from start to finish.

The whole project is overproduced and overly slick, stripping the nuance out of the hymnal nature of the music, music that should be allowed to breathe so that it can shine.

A missed opportunity, then, but also perhaps the beginnings of a creative resurgence.

While there's nothing particularly wrong with looking to the past for influences, Yucca struggles at times beneath the weight of those it seeks to emulate.

As infectious and riotous as If You're Young might well be, the inescapable reality is that the mass middle isn't walking over hot coals to buy this sort of music at the moment.

Decidedly mixed results--but also, a sense of light at the end of the tunnel.

Fortunately, all these madcap tangents pay off amazingly, and we’re left with a sublime, varied LP that’s a perfect accompaniment to the impending sun-pecked skies.

Diehard fans of the genre will find that Bass Drum Of Death makes a welcome addition to their playlists, but for the rest of the music world, Rip This may only entertain for a few tracks.

Better than the first two? Course not. Better than the last three? Definitely.

He has talent, he's capable, and he's got a future - there are occasional flashes of creativity-stuffed aptitude - but this time around they're merely flashes.

Head Carrier is a far more coherent album than Indie Cindy though (hardly surprising, as the latter was effectively a group of EPs welded together) and while it may not be a record to inspire the generations as their previous work did, there’s enough evidence that some of that old spark is still flickering.

Working Girl isn’t an album that will stretch boundaries or break new ground--the best tracks are ones that can’t easily be compared to other artists, such as Taste It and Help Too.

On closer inspection and at a suitably stupid volume, however, Preparations rocks and lurches in grand fashion.

While this isn't the daring brave leap forward that was whispered about when Spiralling was released, it will no doubt prove another multi-million seller for the trio from Battle.

WYWH should be played seasonally to stoke the nostalgic embers of summers past, for it's as equally hazy and precious as the memories it depicts.

The Red Album brings forward everything they do best, with hooks aplenty, emotive and funny lyrics, all washed down with the odd frisson of self doubt. It's a potent mix, and keeps them a step ahead once again.

The spirit of hip hop lives on in N.A.S.A. Investigate this album if you have any taste.

While The Circus will undoubtedly sell bucketloads of copies, it does all become rather samey after a while.

What the Paisley born artist has come up with on Sunny Side Up is baffling.

While Peace does not quite finish on the bang that would have really rounded off a great record, there is no doubt that it reflects the band at their most natural.

A bit more edge would have been good to distinguish this from the wide range of comfy female songwriters out there right now.

Branch’s lyrical savvy and clear communication keep it well clear of the mundane, though you get the recurring impression that she is capable of taking a few more risks.

Complete Strangers is one of those collections where over the course of several listens each song enjoys time as being considered the highpoint of the album only for another track to supplant it soon after. Whisper it, but Vetiver may have just made one of the albums of the year.

With too much empty bluster and not enough decent songs, Sam's Town can only be regarded as a step back for The Killers.

Swoon, then, is a mixed listening experience, with the solemnity and over-seriousness of the general tone and the occasionally grating nature of that voice being more or less mitigated by some lovely melodies and first-rate guitar riffs.

Not only do the sparse arrangements allow Eastburn to enchant with her siren like singing, but also, they allow the listener to become ensnared in the song.

Wooden Arms, on the other hand, bears the sound of something far more collaborative and just that little bit more complete. Our refound love for musical vanguards should therefore also extend to Patrick Watson.

It is perhaps slightly too long and lacks anything as thrilling as Drop The Other, but it nevertheless represents Emika as a fascinating artist with immeasurable promise.

Fandango quickly plateaus into an exercise that is pleasant rather than provocative; an effort that, despite occasional highs, is relentlessly...acceptable.

Like 99% of all other Christmas albums, this will be mostly redundant come 27th December, but if you’re looking for a rather glum festive alternative to the usual Christmas fare, it’s worth checking out.

Pacific Daydreams certainly doesn’t achieve the grandiose aims from the aforementioned inspiring proverb. That said, thankfully it is still a solid record which should satisfy fans.

The later half is really rather spectacularly ace, in an unexpectedly grandiose way.

Listening to the album as a whole, it's satisfyingly compact, a neatly produced record with stand-out tracks and growers.

Joyful and experimental in equal measure, Fluorescence is an album that challenges you without you even realising.

Sure, like much of the album, Rihanna is mining her past glories all over again, but she does it with such swagger, such enthusiasm, that the end result is a definitive thrill-ride of a success.

It may not have the instant appeal of To Lose A Life, but the combination of the running narrative and a host of memorable hooks make it their most consistent record to date.

Snark aside, it's a shame that aside from a couple of notable exceptions, the album title is just about right.

It too often sounds like a diluted version of what’s gone before, a collection that struggles to reach the highs of old.

Pretty, but ultimately uneven record.

It's this flitting between moments of brilliance and sections of dainty sounding but ultimately rather tedious meandering that defines the album.

With the recent break up of Girls, there is certainly an opportunity for Jaill to take the mantle of derivative, vintage pop rock, but they are not quite there yet.

Their seeming insanity only adds to the magic.

Despite the clear-cut influences, Airbourne sound like they just want to rock and have fun in the process of making music to play live. Like Motorhead, this is a band that should be seen in all its headbangin', hair raisin' glory to be fully appreciated.

Vicissitude is such a wispy, bloodless record that it’s hard to find anything to recommend about it.

Jaws have created an album that should see them breaking away from B-Town, heading for sunnier climes and finding themselves.

Kubrick is an ambitious project, but one that works just perfectly as a showcase for the wonderful songwriting and compositional skills of Machin and Glover. It proves, as if it were ever in doubt, that their strength lies not in the skills of their collaborators, but in their music and ideas.

As good as it occasionally gets on I Hear You, the continuously tuneless wail of the vocals are likely to be where the record either succeeds or fails, depending on how much emphasis the listener puts on the vocal element and whether or not they can see past the often painful experience. If only Mr Birdsong had been given lead vocal duties instead.

Too often, the same formula appears with uninspiring choruses being too frequent; whilst these short, sharp bursts of fuzzy punk sound great in small doses, this collection will probably find itself confined to the shelf before long, as its longevity may be questionable with little poppy catchiness present.

Ultimately, Blue Film is a decent, enjoyable album that hints at Hemerlein’s undoubted talent whilst never pulling up too many trees.

In buying in so emphatically into a US pop/soul template, Stone has effectively erased what made her so intriguing in the first place.

Pretty, simple songs which nevertheless were absolutely littered with hooks.

His verses mostly feel redundant, hastily thrown together to validate the presence of these songs on his project, and while the album has been described as introspective this very brief release only allows for skindeep thoughts on any one topic. The Kanye West show has already rolled on, but some of the magic of yesteryear has been left behind.

There’s obviously still an audience for Muse, given by the size of the venues they still sell out, and this will definitely please the die-hards, but most of Simulation Theory simply fizzles out without leaving much of an impression.

All things considered, Hamilton needs to focus less on blending parts together, and more on growing his own food from scratch.

Many of these songs are a delight to listen to; most could easily be a single.

This record feels like half reboot and half memoir. She goes out of her way to acknowledge the fact she’s not a teenager anymore, but with a gentle defiance, a little nostalgia and a subtle change in direction that makes Golden both touching but also really good fun.

It is delicately shaded and tells us more of her hopes, dreams, fears and feelings than any interview ever could. It is this direct communication with her listeners, coupled with the strongest of loyalties to her underground heritage, that makes her music as strong as it is.

This album is too much of a mess to be seen as a worthy follow-up to such a great debut.

Plenty of time is wasted on auto tune, to the detriment of almost all the album's vocals.

It features roughly one good tune to every two mediocre ones.

McGuinness is having a fantastic time on this album, but the try-too-hard attempts at shock value and relatively derivative riffs occasionally detract from what is an otherwise fantastic recontextualization of British alternative rock into older trends.

Gardens & Villa, though, is an album that casts light on its creators' vices as much as their virtues, and, for all the honesty that implies, remains a drawn-out suggestion that the band ought one day to generate a long player more worthy of their principles. Still, not bad for a first go.

At 46 minutes, Recurring Dream isn’t an especially long album. But on the wrong day, at the wrong time and in the wrong frame of mind, it can feel like the longest 46 minutes in the history of all time.

Whether the record would have benefited from the band focusing more on fewer tracks is debatable, but Wicked Nature is in many ways a miniature triumph for an outfit written off by many as has-beens.

The most pleasing element of the album is those earlier demos floating around the internet, have for once been well produced. Songs such as Bandits now have an added edge with more strength, depth and substance to the original foundations.

It truly is awful.

there are occasions on Girl Talk when we get glimpses of what another, better Kate Nash indie rock album would have sounded like.... Unfortunately, moments such as these are the exception, not the rule, on Girl Talk.

It adds up to Folds' finest record yet, and while nobody would dare suggest that Nick Hornby would give up his day job, a sequel to this fascinating collaboration would be more than welcome.

There's a confidence obvious throughout that suggests Sparro will build on what is a strutting debut, even if at the moment he's a big voice with too many small songs to sing.

Black Acetate is in equal measures, serious and mocking, threatening and comforting, ambient and rowdy.

The music here is, at times, superb--it’s just hard to imagine anything (except maybe Rose On Top Of The World or Killed Someone) finding a place in your permanent playlist. And a lot of it is just average, which is probably the worst thing you could say about a band as mercurial as this.

It’s About Time has joyous, feel-good highlights and low points that could have been worse.

Perhaps the global impact of the massive Call Me Maybe is what makes the album as a whole feel like a damp squib, but with or without US Marine parody videos, the rest of the album fizzles out into synth-pop oblivion.

It’s by no means perfect and it does feel slightly one-paced, but the layers of Heritage are undoubtedly worth unravelling.

When certain songs occasionally come within touching reach of greatness, it’s most often through their distinct resemblance to other acts.

It’s become a rather saturated market and, with the ability to craft stunningly effective vocal harmonies and melodies still intact from their early guise, Hegarty’s music is so much more.

For all its ’80s and ’90s pop influence, nothing here sounds dated.

What 85% Proof is, above all, is comfortable, with all the pros and cons that entails.

Yesterday Was Forever provides plenty of evidence that she can still hit top form when she wants to.

Musically it turns out to be blissful business as usual for Ernest Greene on his fourth album under the Washed Out moniker. The bittersweet sentiments remain but they are beautifully expressed and wrapped up in classy production, with a notable tension that hangs on every song.

Whilst there are occasional high points, it’s best to cherry-pick the highlights from Didn’t It Rain and leave the rest.

The duo have set themselves up nicely in a burgeoning genre and whilst their likeness for monochrome isn’t exactly bright, their future surely is.

Where RMX works, it is outstanding, but it is let down by too much flabby excess that for all its artfulness, weighs the album down like a millstone round the neck.

Version is destined to become one of the great party albums of the summer - just playing it once is guaranteed to cheer you up.

When Wildflower works, it works beautifully.

This is an album which feels like it was made quickly, not because of artists reaching a terminal velocity of creativity, but to take maximum advantage of an audience who may not be there this time next year.