'The King Of Nothing Hill' manages to effortlessly stir a Trans Atlantic cauldron of retro flavours, sleazy soul, avant-garde darkness, soundtrack cool, breaks, head nodding jazz sophistication and electronica sus.

Most of this album, basically, doesn't work.

this is pretty much all good stuff. So why does it feel like there's something missing? Haven's problem is their chosen genre - epic, ball busting indie, guitars that jangle, then jangle harder, vocals that ride melody like diseases might pterodactyls.

'Songs For The Deaf' is a triumph, a record forged with fire and sweat in the pits of Valhalla... It is the very essence of Rock.

Fierce and noble and fragile and genuinely moving, 'A Rush Of Blood To The Head' is a lovely furnace of searing goodness made by some wonderful contradictory bastards.

It's painstakingly layered and often lush, but sometimes scrubby and miserably sparse.

The lyrics, insincere as they are, grate somewhat, but the spastic grove cannot be denied they're a bit like a pervy, conservative Devo, with more earwax.

Interpol prove themselves to be men on a mission to take us back to a time when long faces and even longer overcoats were de rigeur for alpha males the musical world over.

'The Magnificent' largely sidelines Jeff's considerable turntablist skills preferring to showcase the talents of his A Touch Of Jazz production company.

Far too often, 'Wiretap Scars' feels limp, lifeless, bereft of dynamics.

Totally inessential, utterly inoffensive, yet truly beguiling, 'Son Of Evil Reindeer' remains a charmingly radiant record.

OK, so it tails off towards the end, and there's something rather dishonest about a band so young releasing a track like '1969', but even then it's quite endearing to see them trying to build such an immediate mythology around themselves.

Anyone else tries this, it'll be like being force-fed Sunny Delight by a battalion of pastel-pashmina'd Pokemon on My Little Ponies. In the hands of The Flaming Lips, with their stellar inventiveness and inquisitive sweetness, it's just utterly noble.

'By The Way' is pretty much 'Californication' part two with a deeper exploration of the nu melodic Peppers, a classic LA record that somehow combines the melodic rush of the Beach Boys and Mamas and Papas and hints at the dark underbelly of the city of angels just like Love did way back in the late sixties.

That the band that churned out some of the best records ever made in a phenomenal two-year creative splurge should be reduced to anything as pubby as this is nothing short of tragic.

There's little here that you won't have heard countless times before but as a pretension-free house album, 'Muzikizum' is an accomplished, pumping affair.

There is just enough balance between the tune, and the unexpected jazz chords, ear-splitting squeals, and lovely harmonic noises to make it forever listenable.

The problem is, whilst the debut had more hooks than a fishing rod sandwich, this just doo-wop-yawn, the sort of nursery rhymes kids never remember.

Yes, it's eclectic and he hasn't just slapped together a ragbag of Ibeefa anfums, but this record essentially suffers from a lack of ambition.

The energy that spills forth from these grooves hails both the positive power of loud guitars and gorges itself on the general insanity of life, but nails it all home with a knowing melodic sense of the anthemic and a musical complexity which elevates the entire album beyond mere thrash and burn histrionics.

Even after one listen it's apparent that 'Untouchables' is a monster of a record.

Whatever you're going to make of 'Heathen', you'll probably agree it's Bowie's most eclectic effort for some time - and a damn enjoyable, rockahula listening pleasure.

It may well be too long and it might stick to its blueprint a little too faithfully, but singularity of vision can hardly be criticised on a debut record. 'Finelines' is a black-hearted but coruscating journey at speed.

When they're good, they're alright, but when they're bad, they're unstoppable and Dirty Vegas' biggest mistake so far is that, sometimes, they're not nearly filthy enough.

Hidden amongst the bilge, there are six proper songs here, with words and everything. But they only serve to prove how erratic Belle And Sebastian have become.

Most of these songs sound like they're taking down whole walls of your average sonic cathedral and replacing them with huge stained-glass windows with a billion pieces in a hundred thousand colours that sparkle like angel's tears when the sun hits them, like. Yes, it is a bit evangelical. It's reverent.

It's all good folks but let's be clear. IT'S NOT GENIUS.

Your new favourite record.

But shorn of the spoken word indulgences and look-what-I've-just-found electronica it's a leaner, hungrier beast, a more focussed, more alluring, more dangerous, but still tender trap.

This is mainly an improvement on a brilliant formula.

It feels too clinical, icy cold, almost sterile.

Not necessarily a fantastic album then, but a great excuse for a record, nonetheless.

An attempted retread that feels more driven by commerce than conviction and suffers as a result.

'Alice' finds the twisted surrealisms of Lewis Carroll's relationship with Alice Liddell offering both refuge and escape for the usual Waits suspects: vagabonds, low-lifes and beautiful lunatics.

Songs that shamble along in the gutter but can still bite your ankles if pushed.

By applying themselves to proper songs with words and everything like Mogwai did last year they've demonstrated why they still belong in the upper echelon of Outpoppers That Matter.

It's not all pleasant.... However, there are some total gems, as you'd expect.

The most worth-the-wait long-awaited album in the world... ever? Could be...

What once felt like maverick defiance on the part of the 'Shop now leaves them looking directionless, with Tjinder sounding increasingly like an unattractive combination of smugness and bitterness.

This is a long soft sigh of an album, suggesting not a sudden relief of pressure but just a pleasant exclamation of contentment.

It sounds oh-so-fashionable, but it isn't simply an instance of über-credible semi-celeb DJ/producer wanking all over his decks and a handful of records no one ever heard of; every single track is not only quality, but accessible.

Ultimately, this is merely a straight-down-the-line rock'n'roll album.

Consistent and cleanly sexy stuff.

A triumph of style and content, a precious thing and proof positive that acid is well good for you.

This will be one of the best things you'll hear all year.

The mix of spite, beauty and pain in here is compelling and repulsive all at once.

Make no mistake, 'Don't Be Afraid Of Love' is so much more ambitious and downright joyful than we had any right to expect that it's a flooring jolt to the system long after the first listen.

'Walking With Thee' is a smoothed-over cacophony where the surreal meets the jovial and declares it an octagonal fish - deadly seriousness with a hint of smirk.

As ever, he's on point, and brilliant.

An album that exudes both class and conviction, and it's a welcome breather from the avalanche of beautiful introspection that's come to characterise 2001.

The good news is that despite the excess verbiage (which at least is hardly a shock), this is a Good Album.

All too often the guitar-led tracks expose their limitations.

Minimal and huge at the same time, desperately sad in places, thought-provoking and ethereal in others, this is an incredible milestone of a record.

An album which feels like a hand-me-down from a ghost.

Too much of 'Geogaddi' just rests on the Boards' well established tricks.

More often than not displays a penchant for melody and tension which would shame many of the new millennium's pop pups.

'Gotham!' is an infinitely danceable and certainly insightful record that gets better with each listen, on every frequency.

'Come With Us' sounds immediately familiar, but this is often problematic, redolent of prior work by both themselves and others.

Admittedly, this time round he's prone to touch on more comfortable territory than before... but often there's a delicious sense of him going back to basics without sacrificing the benefits of modern technology.

The results are almost painfully fashionable, f'sure, but utterly essential nonetheless.

Elbow have made the most passionate, beautiful and downright special record you'll hear this year.

They still sound as spunky and powerful as they were nearly two decades ago when they kicked off this long-term assault on American culture.

'Love Is Here' actually manages to deliver on all that early promise and, more than any of the singles that preceded it, completely conjures up the giant-hearted beauty they're capable of live.

It doesn't strictly feel like a No Doubt album at all.

Gone are the hippy, dippy platitudes of their do-good daisy age; replaced by the most bullish beats, the snakiest rhymes and the overwhelming sensation that you're listening to the undiluted thoughts of the three most intelligent men in hip-hop.

It's crude, certainly, but Ludacris has enough wit and chutzpah to elevate this above the dross.

There's way too much power balladry, rawk guitar, Steven Tyler and MTV-by-numbers to make a genuinely stand-out record.

Lyrically, he's got one thing to say: Kid Rock is back, Kid Rock has lots of money, Kid Rock has the dames licked down, Kid Rock is hard. Which is all good when done properly, with wit, but Kid Rock is not clever, and he's not funny.

The warmth of her debut is still there but now overlaid with something fearsome, forceful and almost overbearing at times.

Tender melodies, modern scrapes and traditional beauty merge into a gently unfolded whole that touches the soul with its silky aesthetics.

Not even the added muscle of playaz like Kid Koala, Afrika Bambaataa, Plug 3, Prince Paul and Mike Patton manage to lift this album above the low level pastiche it seems happy to be.

It does at least manage to include several of the things we hold dearest about Michael Jackson the singer, and it also steers clear of anything as laugh-out-loud as 'Earth Song'.

A much more brutal and vicious record than its predecessor.

Sandoval has a voice quite unlike almost any other and perfectly suited to stark, narcoleptic laments, which is what this, with a couple of curious-if-brief instrumental diversions, delivers on a regular basis.

Everything sounds more accomplished, more intentional than previous efforts. Most important of all, though, 'Drukqs' is an unpredictable (yet compelling) listen.

With 'The Argument' arriving awash in the unmistakably sinewy and elliptic post-hardcore sound Fugazi have made their own (sonically at least) this is more or less business as usual.

New Order are one of the best bands in the world again.

This album is jaunty, scruffy, carefree and accomplished.

There's a rural beauty, crafted by man and machine, in places as exotic as an orchid.

The production is perfect - not too cluttered, lush, beats melting beautifully into the now-understated guitar - and his vocals are warm and unpresuming.

It's a huge album, a beautiful album, a witty album, and above all, a Spiritualized album, through and through. If you like Spiritualized albums, you will love 'Let It Come Down'. If you don't, it may be time for a rethink.

The ghosts of prog exorcised fully at last, Gorky's have once more put in a serious challenge to the Super Furries as Wales' most inventive band, and they've produced an album that, both in terms of its astounding quantum leap and its ambitious orchestration, swings excitingly near to the Delgados' genius breakthrough opus 'The Great Eastern'.

From the opening few seconds of 'Rain On Lens' you just know this album is going to be a classic.

The music itself doesn't quite have the simple accessibility and easy soul of her debut, but it's loads of fun and bursting with ideas.

Distant connections are subconsciously weaved into an undulating whole that fans of electronica, Tortoise and Mogwai will all appreciate - at least in parts.

How deliciously perverse, and how very, very her.

The cool thing about Solex's sampledelia is that she can do it with humour and still avoid the high-frequency buzzing, 60s hi-fi demonstration records and bongwater bubble traps.

It's exactly the album we all demanded from them, but moreso.

Excruciating, toe-curling Pain, the sort that makes you want to leap through windows or run over children.

They've managed to produce a seventh album that's the equal of their baggy debut.

An astonishingly cheeky affair, and arguably less stylistically cohesive than any Orbital album since their underrated debut

Had 'It's A Wonderful Life' been recorded by anyone other than Sparklehorse, we could simply describe it as an amazing record before sitting back to bask in its splendour, but given everything that Mark Linkous has been through, that such a beautiful record not only exists but sounds so effortlessly graceful marks it out as a definite contender for album of the year.

Offers the sound of Stereolab doing what they do best. Love it or hate it, it won't alter the world, it just is.

This is a Warp-inspired wonderland of intricate glitches, murmuring glacial low-end smoothness, and subtle, filmic orchestration.

'Iowa' is a fantastic metal record, ferocious and inventive, but their rage is that of psychotic adolescents rather than reasoning adults. You'll love it!

Think Pavement with a shake of Grandaddy and a little dash of something else low-key and lackadaisical and that's Quasi.

Having created the noise to which great hip and ace hop is made, they are now infusing the genre with new blood, vibe, and funk. The future just happened. [Review of UK version]

However essential it was to make, it just doesn't feel essential enough to keep on hearing.