Despite a four-year wait, the songs on their second album, For Ever, still sound like understudies for Mark Ronson mega-hits.

A record with some rich layers and embellishments, but you sense that the excess of outside influence might be making up for something.

In the Blue Light is not the sound of a man reinventing himself, nor is it a final meditation on decades gone. But in shining a light on a handful of overlooked gems, Simon has succeeded brilliantly.

Brimming with intensity and the analgesic hypnotism that is Pierce’s signature, And Nothing Hurt would make a suitably majestic final Spiritualized album.

So many records as reflective and evocative as Egypt Station prove to be career codas. Despite occasional misfires this one proves that, at 76, McCartney, socially and sonically, still has plenty to say.

Making perfect pop isn’t easy, but Troye Sivan is a star who’s done his homework. With one foot in pop’s past and another in its present, Bloom is a record that could turn its considerate maker into one of mainstream music’s most revered and fascinating talents.

Overall, this is a powerful statement from a laudably liberated artist. A record red in tooth and claw.

Over a visceral torrent of motorik punk-pop pummels recalling prime Pixies or McLusky, Joe hails his “beautiful immigrant” blood brother “Danny Nedelko” and celebrates his “mongrel” upbringing on “I’m Scum”--in a world run by bullish right-wing sex pests, his aggressive compassion is a potent antidote.

While Negro Swan elaborates on Hynes’s best work, he remains grounded in cosy bedroom-pop by shambling drum machines, vocal compressors and gratuitous psych pedals.

Eight albums in, and some of that edgy math-rock experimentalism has been lost, along with two original members of Leon Bridges’ band. But what they now lack in raw, ferocious edginess, they make up for glorious driving riff on Performance.

Their sixth album, Marauder, is their most experimental to date, blending everything from rough garage rock to Motown rhythms. They’re reinvigorated, brimming with energy and self-assurance.

Truly, a remarkable debut.

Seven of the 15 tracks here have been drowned in producer Pharrell Williams’ bubblemint bounce – at points, it’s in danger of sounding more like his record than Grande’s.

Where 2016’s Take Control--with the exception of the aforementioned Dury collaboration--felt like one big raging scream, Acts of Fear And Love sees the band showing their sensitive side as well.

Tangerine Reef gives a musical voice to these alien coral creatures and their aquatic world. If only it were a more mellifluous voice.

A benchmark DCFC record and, barring a surprise drop from The National, the most immersive alt-rock album you’ll hear all year.

Quaintness is what their fans look for; you just sense that there might have been an even more searing political bent lurking beneath on Angry Cyclist that never quite pierced the surface.

Lighting Matches is polished soul and swing with a sharper edge than some of his contemporaries have managed.

It may lack cohesion at certain points, but one thing is never in doubt: Minaj is still one of the best in her field.

Coup De Grace is Kane’s best work to date: punchy, cohesive and lots of fun.

While refusing to close the doors on the synth-pop sound so synonymous with Scissor Sisters, Jake Shears also stands out as a progression; call it the same dance up a different street.

It’s a low-key, subtly composed rock record that sets slow-rolling country and anthemic southern rock as its parameters, and never so much as hints that it might break beyond them.

Ultimately, it’s his own, most career-defining work to date. ... The record progresses--in every sense of the word---he allows himself to become more vulnerable, more considerate.

Ignoring the diabolical “Saviour”, which sounds like a hundred other Nashville-based bands song (featuring the chorus: “Thinking I could save you, I’ll never be your saviour”), the results are much more interesting on the second half.

This is deeply personal material that’s as impressive if not as game-changing as anything esteemed rap figures Kendrick Lamar and Childish Gambino have produced in recent years. Miller has turned his anguish into one of the year’s most disarmingly pleasant records.

Musically progressive, it’s Shires most ambitious work to date; nasty, stomping Southern rock sits next to poppier fare and several moments of quiet introspection.

Living in Extraordinary Times marks a band still working at their full capacity, bringing new ideas and sounds while retaining what inherently makes James James--big choruses, danceable tracks, and timely lyrics.

Qualm may just be the album to solidify her position as one of the most exciting DJ’s in the world at present, as Hauff continues to carve out her very own unique, innovative position in an often cluttered electronic dance landscape.