Blacc proves he’s more than capable of stepping into the spotlight for his first major-label album which features 60s soul, folk, retro pop, R’n’B and even country.

It's sprawling, overdue and not for everyone, but at least it's not a play-it-safe comeback with the hot producer of the day.

Old Fears is the sound of a quick, keen mind at work and play.

The Instagram of albums, which is to say a source of instant nostalgia, its 70s- and 80s-inspired cocktail of disco, house, lounge, samba et al, could be merely kitsch but is elevated both by the meticulousness of its production and the sinuous seductiveness of its melodies.

An unexpectedly enjoyable late addition to a formidable body of work.

The result wears the weight of its history lightly, with the exception of "The Departed", a solemn tribute to lost Stooges.

A passionate, heartfelt, serious, dogged effort, pregnant with reflection and as wise as you could hope for.

This is heartfelt, sweetly sincere and as good an album as BPB has made for some time.

Throughout the exquisitely mournful Violet Cries, Rachel Davies issues Cassandra-like predictions of woe and mayhem, while Thomas Fisher's filigree guitars shimmer like sunset on a lake.

"I wanted", Ocean wrote, "to create worlds that were rosier than mine. I tried to channel overwhelming emotions." Mission accomplished, and then some.

The result is an album of solid country virtue.

Some might call it Kylie for hipsters, but it's quite lovely for that.

A compelling experience.

It's deeply engrossing and rings resoundingly with cultural and historical truth.

Every once in a while, the results can be more enjoyable than the main event (see Stephen Stills' Manassas). And this may be true of CRB.

Blunderbuss does, at times approach his finest work. But it doesn't do anything he hasn't already done.

It can be plodding and takes a while to get going, but also occasionally reaches soaring, festival-fields-at-dusk heights.

It's tender, touching and not nearly as miserable as its subject matter suggests.

The end result is a tense, powerful and emotive piece of work.

Carry Me Back ticks all the boxes: jaunty, soulful, nostalgic without being cloying.

A skittering collage of vocal drum'n'bass, garage, and funky house that parties, in the best way, like it's July 1999.

Too late for those album of the year polls?

In a crowd of loudish country and R&B guitars he tells brief stories of everyday lives with a correspondingly everyday voice, but with a kind of unslung abandonment that goes rather well with the guitars. It's very good.

While there is nothing here which startles, the spirit of the music is vivid.

"What's Wrong with America" is the masterpiece, doo-wop and social protest mixed with God-bothering. Someone book them for a festival, quick.

We get grooves as smooth and tight as Lycra, funky stabs of brass and arch lyrics delivered with cool detachment.

It's derivative and is a near hybrid of Mew, the Postal Service, M83 and Empire of the Sun, but it's perfectly likeable without ever inspiring outright love.

Two non-trad covers (Anais Mitchell and Fleetwood Mac) remind you that he's earnt the right to do what the hell he wants.

An album which should win prizes (but won't), and hearts (and will).

This is an artist with taste and opinions of her own, not just a schedule and a fanbase to satisfy.

For all Bird's reverence for American rural music of the past, Hands is startlingly contemporary.

It is a glossy thing that entwines her Californian folky yin around his Southern gothic yang.

Sounds like Kraftwerk's Autobahn driven by a tractor. Forget Krautrock, and say hello to Yokelrock.

“Inside the Idle Hour Club” is the comedown: woozy, wavy, lush, long. Not exactly cohesive then, but hey--it’s a trip.

They've enlisted non-dance musos such as Robert Fripp, Barry Adamson, Nick Zinner and Josh Homme, as well as relative young 'uns Cat's Eyes and Factory Floor, with often delicious results

A real gem.

If this isn't Foals' pop classic or their art masterpiece, they're having a huge amount of fun squaring that circle.

[An] exceptionally artful debut.

The danger is that they might spread themselves too thin, but on this evidence they've kept their best ideas close to their chests.

In spite of the self-conscious effort to create something "beautiful", the songs slowly reveal themselves to be things of real beauty.

There are 36 performances, most of them evincing a spumey "aaaargh, Jim-lad" recreational vibe.

Though it's far from his worst album, it's his least commercial – with its harsh beats, mangled vocals, and Marilyn Manson samples, it mimics the aesthetics of a DIY mixtape.

Redemption by plucked string. Buddy Miller produces analogically.

His most enjoyable LP since Our Favourite Shop.

The odds-and-ends nature of this compilation is spelt out by its title, but the quality barely suffers for that.

And whaddayaknow, this ugly duckling – out of a hoodie and into a tux – turns out to have a fine white soul voice and has followed a record you couldn't bear to hear more than once with a record you'll want to play over and over.

Halstead's songs and Euros Childs-like voice breathe the sort of honesty and goodness that's harder and harder to find in the iTunes age.

There’s less barn-floor stomp than on previous albums, but Country Mile is still rousing, with trumpet, fiddle and much--occasionally dicey--harmonising.

It shows a musical maturity way beyond its creator's years.

Her talent and pain are equally raw and equally audible.

Back to Forever moves things into the 1980s--all fist-pumping verses and “Kids-in-America”-like big choruses.

Arc is built with daytime radio in mind as much as the indie disco.

It's great.

The fourth album from the award-winning strings-and-sisters folksters is a thing of shivery and spooky charms.

As an exercise in expanded range, Shangri La is too diverse and distinct to dismiss.

Though there's no smash hit leaping out, with its consistent unity of atmosphere, The Fall is the most cohesive Gorillaz album yet.

Exquisitely poised solo pieces that subtly pay homage to the likes of fellow keyboard masters Abdullah Ibrahim and Erik Satie.

Fans of Raising Sand and O Brother...will find much to love. As – more surprising this – will fans of classic-era Fleetwood Mac.

Simon Green, aka Bonobo, has created a beguiling and compelling narrative.

The second Yelle album is essential for anyone who appreciates dancefloor-friendly European synth pop.

You know exactly what to expect: high-energy, hugely entertaining garage rock. And, with the odd exception, that's what they deliver.

It's an album which makes you feel warm.

He sets his bruised but unbowed soul against a stark musical backing and rediscovers the power of keeping it simple. Beautiful.

Give it time and the intensity of the music--the Hagar of the title is Lloyd's great-great grandmother, who was sold into slavery--comes through.

The live stuff is consistently inventive.... Randomness dogs the remixes, but that's standard.

"Yes You Do", a 1950s rock'n'roll love song updated for the synth age, is the standout track, but "Bassline" is the most typical.

It's almost boring: yet another excellent British Sea Power album.

Few bands do that thing - spitting the venom of the dumped, but somehow staying romantic at the same time - better.

It takes a few plays to acclimatise to but, once won over, whatever you listen to next will seem pedestrian by comparison. Lovely, but wholly on its own terms.

Lovely album from a true one-off.

Reuniting him with Slowhand/Backless producer Glyn Johns for the first time in four decades, I Still Do is Eric Clapton’s most assured album in ages, its understated poise and refinement reflecting the influence of his late compadre JJ Cale.

On the evidence of this [album] one can safely say that the Dø are the best French/Finnish duo in pop.

Her first UK release is a polished, bluegrassy thing of no small wonder.

There's enough on the highly politicised Macaroni to justify stepping outside to find him.

Happily, beardy-weirdy Texas psych-folkies Midlake manage to weather Tim Smith’s split with no pinch in purpose or progress.

It’s business as usual, only with a lusher production than expected and a tad too much emphasis on Western rock’s tired tropes in some of the licks.

Touching and strangely beautiful.

Listened to sympathetically, as soppy late-night jazz, it’s fine. Just don’t expect sparks to fly.

It may be a bit rushed--too sickly sweet for one sitting, while their youthful lyrics will ripen yet--but the hit rate is nonetheless impressively high.

A couple of tunes, including the title track (one of two West Side Story selections, along with "Tonight"), can even sound a little pedestrian, the swing faltering. But, given time, most of it works.

The slightly sterile neo-soul fump of the Roots may lack the feel of their progenitors but the songs make up for that.

Generation Indigo is a hugely enjoyable electro-pop album.

The occasional off-kilter touch throws things sufficiently askew to deny listeners any complacency.

Bar that electric guitar, this is the kind of music that you wouldn’t be surprised to hear on an old piece of 78rpm vinyl rescued from a car-boot sale (which is, of course, meant as a compliment).

This is a belting return to form by the best vocal artist in jazz.

There is nothing not to love about it.

All of it frothed up into an accomplished brew and delivered with good-timey vim but without a whole lot of charisma, especially in the vocal department. Snake oil, in other words. Good fun snake oil.

An undiscovered diamond.

Bewitching.

It's his best group for eons.

Obscure or not, they're songs worth learning, especially when sung as gorgeously as this.

This is jouncey, mostly R&B-derived pop with a keen ear for what supports a melody. It's good.

Divine Comedy’s Neil Hannon and Pugwash’s Thomas Walsh strike another fine balance between cricket’s arcane specifics and its universal metaphors in cucumber-crisp batches of catch-all pastiche-pop.

White Lies have just enough elegance and intrigue beneath the bluster to carry it off.

The orchestra's work is subtle and supportive rather than flashy, allowing free rein to that astonishing voice.

Woon's work is unashamedly bucolic (he writes songs about going for a walk) and beat-literate (he's worked with Burial), and his tremulous, medieval folk singer voice makes it perfectly bearable.

There isn’t a shadow of doubt expressed here about where Mavis is going, but there is plenty of feeling that the journey, like all journeys, is bordered with darkness.

[Life is Good] proves once again that Nas is one of the smartest and most skilled players in the game.