Always a one-off, Hynde is magnificent here--unapologetic and deferring to no one.

Retains Elbow's best qualities - embittered romanticism and pretty, twisty melodies - while infusing them with hooks galore.

Frequent appearances of a quavering clarinet, hardly rave culture’s go-to instrument, further enhance the very particular beauty of his vision.

The Velvet Underground-worthy Los Angeles: City of Death is the closest this Swans incarnation comes to rock and unusually for a band of this vintage, they’re still springing surprises, such as the way Michael Is Done suddenly erupts into beatific rapture reminiscent of early Brian Eno.

Purists may cry sacrilege, but the Roxy Music singer vastly improves Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues and All Along the Watchtower by imbuing their edgy agitation with his classicist pop sensibility.

Less commercial than her last album, maybe, but it’s a finely sung, pained and intimate set.

The best thing about their self-titled debut might be their four-part harmonies.

In a year of impressive solo rap albums, Staples has managed to create one that’s arguably the most idiosyncratic of the lot.

Hunger of the Pine and Warm Foothills are stunningly pretty, although This Is All Yours is a more a collection of sublime hooks and textures rather than conventional songwriting.

That the songs on the record, which largely deals with race and oppression, were written by a white man [Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy] could have undercut the emotional heft. But Staples has had decades of practice delivering truths as part of the Staple Sisters--who were celebrated for their gospel “message songs”--and her performance here is so utterly convincing it feels like a moot point.

Some of the top lines are nagging in their immediacy – the joyous “do-do-do’s” on the 90-second Bop positively tickle you in the armpits – but others are cleverly minimal, like the announcements on the chorus to Empty in My Mind.

Another skinny indie kid singing about love and the human condition might not sound essential, but Omori has decided to take the high road and craft something special.

each of Convivial's nine tracks unfolds gradually--only one clocks in at under six minutes--not one moment is wasted.

It would be a hard listen were it not for the fact that the music is so great: tropical house shot in soft-focus and slow-motion, orchestrated 70s singer-songwriter ballads, every melody and chorus finished to a uniformly high standard.

Filthy, vicious fun, as always.

Oberst's frequent comparisons to Bob Dylan won't suffer, but he has also conjured up some of his best tunes, especially Hot Knives and If the Brakeman Turns My Way, with themes of alienation and self-medication.

It leaves one pondering why more bands don't move to the countryside, if it produces such delicious melancholy.

This reissue tweaks the sound with little discernible effect, and adds a package of goodies.

This is music to get lost in, for headphones, and for your head. Yorkston’s talents as a writer drive these songs (he has also released a memoir and a novel in recent years). Phrases leap out, some delicate, some devastating.

Essaie Pas have gone beyond cliche and fandom to make something that truly speaks to the dynamic thought and droll humour at the heart of Dick’s writing.

These are songs to learn and sing as loudly, messily and drunkenly as possible.

For all its brevity, ye doesn’t feel slight. Substantially more focused than its predecessor, it packs a lot into 23 minutes. It is bold, risky, infuriating, compelling and a little exhausting: a vivid reflection of its author.

It has a unifying historical and social agenda--but it's a discreet one, and the music is certainly the priority.

Bad Bunny feels less like part of the current pop landscape than an artist operating slightly adjacent to it. He is separated from the pack as much by a desire to take risks as by his roots.

It works best when the music hall bawdiness is left aside in favour of bleak euphoria.

The least idiom-specific tracks like those, diverted from familiar song-shapes, are the most eloquent--but Frisell would find it hard to do anything unmusical if he tried.

What Born to Die isn't is the thing Lana Del Rey seems to think it is, which is a coruscating journey into the dark heart of a troubled soul... What it is, is beautifully turned pop music, which is more than enough.

Nostalgia for noughties and Britpop guitar hits echoes throughout--but played by a gang of twentysomethings, its wide-eyed conviction amplifies the emotional carnage.