No Sounds Are Out Of Bounds, with its stylistic and thematic missteps, too often shakes us out of this trademark groove.

Despite the name, Crooked Man's greatest fault is ultimately how straight Barratt plays it.

Where Bad Vibes had a dynamic range of feeling, Dark Red is melodramatic to the point of being alienating.

Runddans is an intriguing and sometimes fun experiment, but it's not quite a meeting of great musical minds.

As the white noise whooshes and the snares roll on Adrian Hour's "Make You Feel Good" (a track that was released on Toolroom four years ago), it's difficult not to sense an artist also drifting in the opposite direction, towards a sound that he'd struggle to call his own.

What we're left with is an uneven album that's rarely as profound or as meaningful as it tries to be.

Caracal has the effect of a magician performing a trick twice in a row, rendering once clandestine, miraculous movements suddenly obvious, over-rehearsed and unnatural.

Even though Brighter falls short, in this context it does illustrates that the indie WhoMadeWho infuse their dance with has more funk and attitude than most.

Listening to Imagin is like pulling on a old pair of trainers: comfortable, familiar and, ultimately, rather boring.

A somewhat stunted, companion piece to their debut, all the more frustrating for their lack of real development.

Ghettoville doesn't sound like the work of a producer who's no longer able to make wondrous music; there's enough craft and intention here to suggest that, for whatever reason, he just didn't this time.

There's an excellent 12-inch (or two) hidden in Addison Groove Presents James Grieve.

Ultimately, Reachy Prints is a bravura performance that lacks bite.

Brute's most interesting flourishes are all surface-level. Take them away and you're left with Al Qadiri reusing the same musical ideas.

The reason that the DJ-Kicks series has remained relevant is that even at its so-called worst, it was still saying something about the overall state of electronic dance music. With Gold Panda's entry-despite its cleverness and state-of-the-art, diverse penchants-you're left with the impression the famous !K7 cycle has nothing more this time than a muted episode on its hands.

The album has bags of character and is big on ideas. Unfortunately, not all of them work. ... Jarring sounds and heavy-handed ideas dominate the album's second half and ultimately spoil the record.

The endorphin-rush techno of "Forgive Me," meanwhile, is sure to ignite one of his main stage festival sets. That's the setting in which Boratto shows his energy and confidence as an artist. Too much of Pentagram, by contrast, feels tired or confused.

At its best, the LP touches on the dizzying maximalism that made past records so thrilling. But at other times it treads the same ground as the healing frequency meditation videos that proliferate on YouTube.

Glow dumbs down Niemerski's music into mass market-ready chunks.

The album certainly isn't a waste of time, but most disappointing is that it lacks an intensity and message.

Rundell and Goddard are still crafting warm, well-balanced tracks, but the parts that reveal their personalities—namely the lyrics--are often awkward and strangely didactic.

Stones and Woods is a frustrating body of work, with good ideas poorly realised and arresting moments interrupted by annoying ones.

As you unspool slowly into Aimlessness, you can't help but wish for a more mediating human touch.

Gately describes her method as a question: "How much can I add before it just sounds too crazy. What's the most obnoxious thing I can make the song do?" With Color, she's overshot.

Suddenly is a frustrating listen. Snaith's talent for writing earworms, hooks and choruses has never been so apparent. But overall he sounds like he's trying too hard, taking influence from too many places.

Gibson's earlier work mixed pop mastery with genuine feeling. Actual Life 3 is the Hollywood remake, with not-quite-convincing lookalikes and a script laden with clichés.

Without its academic trappings, Projections starts to grate, with its middle-of-the-road niceness and mood of tepid celebration. With them, it's borderline offensive.

The whole album sounds like it was mastered from a chewed-up old C90--it's post-chillwave music, busy and glitchy, but as relaxing as a soak in a warm bath.