Over rudimentary backing beats, in that "ya feel me?" accent, his humour often hits the spot. However, the going-through-Customs skit, followed by a track about having his urine tested at the airport, is as tedious as it is righteous.

An example of its genre it most certainly is.

It's high-class karaoke, covering the Chi-Lites, Dorothy Moore, The Dells, Womack & Womack.

A loose-limbed, spacious, American indie-folk-rock. Political, challenging, dissatisfied and, naturally, righteous.

A charming companion piece to The Best of...

It won’t frighten the horses, but it might encourage you to buy an overpriced T-shirt.

Dazzling songs, dismally sung.

It remains the case that this kind of thing only has something to say about distance travelled, no more.

Apart from a bit of pedal steel and some gospel backing vocals, it sounds a lot like a Snow Patrol record, rendering the whole exercise somewhat redundant.

Her Lennox-meets-Tyler, or Welch-meets-Tunstall lungs boom out across a Heart FM-friendly pop-rock sound which sometimes attains a sweeping Stevie Nicks drama but often merely reaches Dido level.

What Corazon certainly contains is a brightly recorded, punchy collection of “Latin” beats and melodies, plus some rock, featuring a handful of distinguished guests and the familiar overflying drone of Carlos’s own guitar obbligati.

Despite a version of Earth Wind & Fire's "After The Love Is Gone" that is so good you can play it for days, this dream-team collaboration between jazz singer Elling and big-time weirdo producer Don Was delivers less than it promises.

None of it is clumsy but, equally, none of it truly escapes the originator's gravitational field.

The beats aren't always the best, but Wretch, who lives on the notorious Tiverton Estate and whose "mum's still living in the ends", has a self-awareness lacking in many of his peers.

While newer tracks “My Song 5” and “Let Me Go” snag by throwing surprisingly moody shapes, Martika-esque closer “Running if You Call My Name” sounds like something smoothed for A-list romcom duties.

The Vega songwriting style is hardwearing.

A cloudless orgy of nostalgia.

Chris Thile is the most remarkable mandolinist in the world; fluent, articulate and sometimes just a little too clever to be truly engaging.

Much of the time, it's reheated Madchester. The rest, it's over-literal psychedelia.

Reconvening after a four-year hiatus, the duo have carried on where they left off--meaning the Frankmusik-produced TW is gentle, blissful and devoid of the exuberant electro romps of yesteryear.

This is a sweet, light confection, but insubstantial as whipped cream and too sugary for some tastes.

In place of the suavité we associate with Songbook Rod, we get a whooping, sequenced modernisation of 1970s Guitar-Rock Rod.

At its best, in the opening “All Will Surely Burn” and in a thrilling closing version of “Rivers of Babylon”, this is mesmerising trance music of great power.

Both gently gripping and strangely sinister.

This is a very capable attempt to update that swoonable sound, and the arrangements do offer a few contemporary touches.

It adds up to a shallowly appealing, summery package; glossily produced and personality free.

The treatments range from Schifrin/Morricone atmospherics to full on Prokofiev/Tchaikovsky bombast, with results which are variable, but the scary choral, Omen-style version of "Where's Your Head At" is a hoot.

It is derivative and woebegone and its musical twists are seldom hard to predict, but it is also finely crafted and devoid of the phoniness which can make such works unbearable.

It's all a bit "junior school music project" at times, and there's nothing John Cale wasn't doing half a century ago, but it's nevertheless an impressive work.

For anyone who lived through grunge, this is mere nostalgia. Anyone who didn't is advised to go straight to the source.

He comes on like a Conor Oberst meets Brian Wilson in a ramshackle approach that sounds to these ears like a refreshing burst of honest emotion in an often pallid musical landscape.

Ferguson's smoky tones recall the young Aretha Franklin at her more restrained, [but] it's all ever so slightly boring.

Essential for fans, of course. It is left to the rest of us to look on from a safe distance with our hard hats on and to marvel at the most self-regarding singing voice in post-war popular music.

It's charming enough, but it's as well mannered as a picnic with Cath Kidston accoutrements.

Gimmicks aside, any version of TFIM with a core of "Little Shocks", "Start with Nothing", "When all is Quiet", "Man on Mars" and "Heard it Break" won't go far wrong. [Review of UK release The Future Is Medieval]

Casual bystanders might wish for more memorable songs or some advancement of the form.

Bradley, a 62-year-old ex-plumber and James Brown impersonator, has a raspy, infinitely pained voice but there doesn't appear to be any real interaction between him and the band.

It's two-thirds pretty good, all the same.

Precocious, certainly, exhilarating, at times, Lorde’s debut album is almost but not quite as good as it thinks it is.

DeMent cuts through the sheen with a simplicity that reaches back through decades.

She's an oblique writer and arranger, though, often interesting, never predictable.

The very home-made, amateur-sounding production, coupled with what was obviously a fully formed musical vision, carries great charm and will appeal to fans of Scottish indie jazz weirdo Bill Wells as much as funkers, although only the first two of eight tracks excel.

It is a lush thing that, were we writing for a certain type of women’s mag, might have us reaching for words such as "candles" and "bubble bath."

It's a shame the God-bothering pomp of John Legend collaboration "The Believer" spoils it all at the end.

Lakeman writes, sings, plays, produces and mixes, which may or may not explain the rather dry, stoney sound of the album and the rhythmic forthrightness of the playing.

As is conventional with contract filler, this is not going to be a go-to album in the canon.

Too safe, too familiar...and was that really a power-ballad key change? Good guitarist when the songs allow it, though.

It does just enough to bring "happy" to you, and you've gotta love the black humour of any band who'd call a song "God Help This Divorce".

The Origin of Love is an autotuned, multitracked meringue whose ingredients include 10cc and Buggles, and whose only weakness is the absence of a killer single.

It's actually a more interesting artifact than the Mitchell one. Having said that, it is also hobbled by a paucity of good songs and a slightly splashy production. Solomon rides the turbulence like a whale.

The Blue Note debut can be as frustratingly tentative as his first outing for RCA 15 years ago.... Things do heat up, with drummer Eric Harland stoking the fires, but there's no big flame.

The writing is generic, the studio-craft impressive. Enjoyment will depend on how you get on with the voice and its hooting cannonade of mannerisms.

Venturing further into radio-friendly pop-rock than ever before, her fourth album showcases a strong voice which (unlike brother Rufus) actually hits the notes.

As a soundtrack, sure; as a record, one for the completist.

It is not a substantial offering, nor does it plough a new furrow--but it is a buzz.

Evolution is a perfect Frankenstorm of over-produced American R&B.

Suggests and afternoon in Ikea. Snorbital.

One minute it's like listening to early Genesis, the next Smile-era Beach Boys, the next XTC and the next, um, 1980s Genesis.

Spread over a 67-minute album, their second with new voice William DuVall, that grinding insistence first impresses, then just grinds.

Home Again is sweet, inoffensive, well-intentioned and gently, grainily melancholic, and it operates most fluently at the slow temperature which offends some while delighting others.

It's bright and brash, sometimes almost life-affirming, but leaves you wondering two things (the influence of Graceland and singing in a comedy "foreign" accent).

Their most consistent and accomplished album to date.

It's much more fun than the Brandon Flowers album. Which, admittedly, isn't very big talk at all.

A partial return to top form for the widdly-diddly axe-meister.

Smart, thoughtful lyrics about everything from iPods to the Arab Spring.

Taken in individual portions, they're a refreshing jolt to the system, but a whole album's worth feels like being force-fed a gallon of Sunny Delight.

It's broodingly impactful stuff, only hampered by the kind of self-parodically indie-kid vocals that remain in a permanent state of posturing ennui.

You’re not listening to songs so much as attempting to pull up the past as if it were an old pair of trousers, and then rope it into place with lengths of digital cable. It is both ridiculous and oddly moving.

[Four] sees them rediscovering guitars with a vengeance – and many tracks here come with the sort of epic quality that has helped Muse filled arenas.

It’s still the instrumentals, with their bass growls and motorik rhythms, moody ambience, psychedelic wig-outs and violent moodswings, that have the most flavour.

Restlessness and drive applauded, but oh for the sound of those demons.

Spalding tries to breathe new life into the dead form of smooth jazz-fusion. And nearly succeeds.

Flitting between 1980s soul-pop and jerky indie, it has its big, brash, pop-rock moments.

It isn't long before their second album goes sour, settling into a pattern of either doctrinaire psych-rock or alt-country which recalls the Dandy Warhols in their more meandering moods.

Not for the faint-hearted, nor those offended by religion. Often brilliant.

Ultraviolence is more of the same, but less.

Though less folky than their 2010 debut, Blood Speaks sticks to the harmonies and arpeggios formula that made their Jack White-produced "Gastown" single so memorable.

Bracing stuff.

Yorke's lyrics, consisting mainly of repeated aphorisms and clichés ("A penny for your thoughts", "I've made my bed, I'll lie in it"), don't suggest any great depth.... But the sounds, bringing in elements of tropicalia, Afro-funk and laptronica, with glitches, rainforest sounds and superb analogue-synth squelches (if anyone steals the show here, it's Godrich), mean you hardly notice.

All elegantly arranged and written in self-consciously prosy style. He'd say wry. I'd say borderline sententious.

Not easy. Not pleasant. But touching in parts, if only because of Martyn's honest gaze.

He's not breaking any moulds--it's solid, guitar led, pop-rock--but then Marr is the man for that job.

If you replace the techno with ambient tones and piano noodles, he can sound a little reedy and exposed.

Like most of Unapologetic, it's ["Nobody's Business" is] instantly forgettable.

The caprine warble of solo Steve Nicks has broken its silence after 10 years to explore the idea that nothing lasts forever, especially in affairs of the heart.

At times, listening to The Civil Wars is like wading through a swamp of still-raw emotion. It is an album that is more haunted than haunting.

Beyoncé's strident triumphalism is displaced by muted heartbreak and the cookie-cutter R&B of her mega-sellers ditched for a subtle, stripped-down sound that suggests someone's been listening to Janelle Monae.

There’s a personal context (Mac’s dad was a famous singer of spirituals), the band is great, the vibe folksy.

New project HDBA (a translation of the German name for the board game Frustration) sees him actually having fun, after a fashion.

Balminess, after all, is the chief asset of this second album's slow-rolling, harmonic country-gospel jams.

In most cases, the cupboard seems its best home.

It's the very definition of "not bad", but surely there's some urgent paint you need to watch drying instead?

What We Saw..., then, is the usual Spektorish mixed bag of literate genius and "look at me" showboating.

Nothing you wouldn't expect.

It all hangs together quite nicely if, as ever, rather uninvolvingly.

If you loved Williams the way he was, rejoice. If you didn't, it may be time to switch off the radio and television for a few months, and bury your head in a bucket of calamine lotion.

It might be more accurate to say that nearly all of the songs on Whispering Trees aim for "Satellite of Love" but come closer to achieving Sky dish of desire.

Rizzle Kicks are best when brisk and larky--more heartfelt musings on love and being true to yourself are banal.