It makes for something of a experimental jam session where its members are trying to perfect a unified sound alongside different lyrical approaches, which strike a fine balance between campy sci-fi imagery and silly, doom-laden metal tropes. And yet, once it’s fused all together it comes across as one big slab of raucous, careening psychedelia. King Gizzard are still grounded to their garage roots.

The mixtape-like sequencing of Saturn occasionally minimizes her ability to write hit after hit--there's hardly a dud here--even if she just misses the mark at producing a more involving mood piece.

His irrepressible, grizzled vocal is the master key to the soul that is often kept hidden behind the pewter façade, and it’s the desire for more glimpses into it is what makes Gargoyle as affecting as it is.

Wildflower is simply a joy, an euphonious hour-long journey that exists in some wonderfully naive and blissful alternate universe. It’s an aural paradise you’ll never want to leave.

Faking the Books... is to Tridecoder and Scary World Theory as OK Computer was to The Bends – a quantum evolutionary leap that, taken consecutively, quite takes your breath away.

With Skying, The Horrors continue to explore familiar territory whilst refining their idiosyncratic slant like proficient tastemakers.

Lisbon is up to the band's usual high standards; if you've followed their career closely that's really all you need to know.

While no commercial crossover will be gained from Eye Contact, Gang Gang Dance have released one of the most captivating albums of the year, each song different yet cohesive, challenging and ultimately highly rewarding.

What makes all this work, however, is Iceage’s commitment to darkness. Their signature, dirgey melancholia broods through standouts like Catch It and the title track, reminding listeners that while Iceage are willing to embrace pop, they’ll never do it with a smile.

Both cynical and biting, Nothing Feels Natural is a timely and involving call to arms that promises great things from Priests sooner rather than later.

Heroic, monumental and wondrously sensual.

Grinderman 2 follows with more of a racket, still the full-throttle guitar-driven rock meant to separate men from boys.

It’s not always the most memorable listen, though through its free-flowing divagations we finally begin to feel more empathy for an artist who’s too perceptive to hide behind his taut guitar accents.

Devour is best experienced from front to back. Shifting from Chardiet’s possessed screams (Spit It Out), to the dial-up-modem-from-Hell (Self-Regulating System), to grotesque static (Deprivation), Devour is shockingly sublime, like some warped, morally corrupt gradient. What’s equally mystifying is how textured and thematic these songs are, subtleties and surprises that are only revealed through brave, dedicated consumption.

What she's gained in the process is more focus and confidence, and as PAINLESS proves, an intriguing foreshadow of things to come.

Lykke Li holds to her regal aesthetic and simple drum and bass lines doggedly; whether stripped down or ramped up she has a well crafted, appealingly consistent sound, and it's what she puts over this that completes it.

With this latest effort, Superchunk have proven just that, and done so in their own insightful, rocking way and without compromise. All hail the kings (and queen).

Their free form approach is certainly amusing, perhaps too cerebral at times, but that’s just another way of reinforcing they want us to figure out what they’re aiming for.

Although Marika Hackman’s covers album lacks for originality in the title department, she more than makes up for it over the course of the ten tracks.

Centralia finds Mountains in their finest form yet, indicating a new level of comfort in the space they've been carefully carving out over the past decade.

She’s emerged from the thickets of Laurel Hell more assured than ever before.

Even if this type of thing isn’t your bag, it’s really pretty irresistible and is worth a shot.

From start to finish, The Hunter is a collection of songs that inadvertently expands their repertoire and capabilities while they turn off their heads and let their fingers tell the story.

In the case of Blackjazz, Shining spreads lyrical passages across songs, repeats song titles with different music attached: they basically create an environment that can only be understood as a whole.

It feels like they've been doing this for years, and while they quite literally all have, the way they have formed and moulded that sum of past experience into one new entity is nothing but impressive.

Snaith is able to hold onto his Caribou identity despite the new techno influences. His new album Swim reaffirms the supreme artistic capability that is Caribou.

There is a monumental feeling of strength and courage in their music that is impossible to deny.

Aside from dubstep-resembling "I Don’t Love You Anymore”, a breakup song that doesn’t really mesh within the political context of Hopelessness, there’s hardly any fault to find in Hegarty’s incredibly imaginative portrait of a world that’s in dire need of some reformation.