Most of these songs will startle you at some point. [#268, p.50]

It’s an impressive whole, even if a few of the individual parts don’t hold up to scrutiny. [Jul 2021, p.70]

If Atrocity Exhibition doesn’t connect with quite the same power, it’s not for lack of commitment or craft. [Oct 2016, p.53]

Propulsive and beautifully weighted, this is music of absolute clarity. Sangare’s voice gleams adamantine. [Oct 2020, p.67]

“Hot Pink” reads clearly like “BIPP”-era SOPHIE, with its urgent metallic breakdowns and deep, heavy bass lines, while the high synth registers and spatial ambient of “It’s Not Just Me” conjecture a Generation Z folk-pop-disco hybrid. As a more mainstream addition to the avant-pop trajectory of artists like SOPHIE and felicita, however, Let’s Eat Grandma are not nearly as disruptive and original. [Sep 2018, p.49]

It is al-gitarra in the classic style: raw and intimate, with the gravel-voiced Abaraybone leading the band through the militant and melancholy blues that have long been his trademark. [Oct 2019, p.61]

Much of the album feels like this – danceable songs with lyrics that urge thought about the state of the world and your own place within it. The most engaging moments are those where Hval lets herself escape into the pure fun of making jams. ... On a quarantine album, a little bit of escapism feels right. Hval continues to ponder philosophy in her writing, but throughout Classic Objects she brings light to her fears and memories too. [Mar 2022, p.48]

Pateras is much less dominant in the mix, mostly smouldering beneath the scintillating haze of distortion but occasionally slicing through like white light. Sitting on top of the mix are an assortment of glowing meditation bells played at unexpected intervals, which have the effect of plucking awareness from the dark recesses of sound one could otherwise be pulled all the way into. [May 2019, p.63]

Even beyond this shared ending/beginning, the new material flows like a continuation of the previous album, but with a more progressive and tenser edge to it. [Apr 2022, p.56]

It's an unlikely triumph of personality, a glacially slow decay of his icy facade revealing an earnest dedication to his craft, in its own way every bit as spiritual as his brother's more orthodox practice. [Feb 2016, p.56]

In Cauda Venenum is a peculiarly convincing example of retro rock but that’s not to say the album is anchored to one particular scene or era. ... What’s also helpful is that frontman and bandleader Mikael Åkerfeldt has one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary rock, an impassioned croon whose soulfulness defuses any potential for pomposity. [Dec 2019, p.57]

I found myself wishing [the booklet] was three times longer and the music three CDs less. [Nov 2011, p.60]

Gay’s latest is a deep dive into memory but emerges as a triumphant celebration of a past and future antilineage, uniquely conjured from the inner complexities of an artist not tortured by the past but possessed by it. [Dec 2021, p.50]

Less successful is “Turned To Stone”, a somewhat sluggish performance that indicates a temporary loss of direction, hobbled by formless vocal grunts that are accompanied by bouts of panic stricken death metal guitar noodling when the otherwise omnipresent grim mood falters. Mercifully Obituary swiftly regain their footing and kick back with “Straight To Hell.” [Apr 2017, p.52]

At nearly two hours long, it can get claustrophobic and anti-exuberant out of these tunes' native club element.... Nonetheless, there's an undeniable freshness.

Their words are not protest or polemic, but messages from the frontline of a war that’s being waged under our noses and hidden in plain sight. And also, crucially, it completely slaps. [Jun 2022, p.44]

This album feels more urgent and defiant than its predecessor. [Jun 2023, p.49]

Especially potent are moments in which Rundle’s velvety delivery overlaps with Bryan Funck’s bitter growls. Here, they find strength in one another and traverse a valley infested by guitar riffs dripping with filth, earthshaking tom hits and forlorn swirls of folk, leaving behind a harsh yet stunning trail of music. [Dec 2020, p.62]

Combined with the sincere and fiery anguish of Lenker’s delivery, this propensity for surprise makes Big Thief a genuinely affecting proposition. [Nov 2019, p.50]

The music develops through collective improvisation, but it’s supremely focused and tight. These formal qualities are combined with a keen political edge. [Jul 2021, p.58]

His voice retains a high pitched vulnerability, but the urgency of his reports from the flipside of hippiedom have softened into the sound of someone more comfortable with their place in the universe. [Sep 2013, p.48]

There’s no subject harder to broach in polite society than loneliness. Martin and Robinson know this and should be commended for taking an extended gaze into this particular abyss. [Mar 2019, p.54]

Tasteful pedal steel from Lanois gives a gentle country inflection to cuts like “Arajghiyine” – there’s a neat dovetailing here between two desert musics – but Tinariwen’s refined nocturnal heaviness reigns unchallenged. [Oct 2023, p.60]

Oddly charming, goblincore aesthetic, one that capitalises on Björk’s unique strengths: the arrangements on Fossora are among the most complex and lavish of her career. [Nov 2022, p.58]

On The Comeback Kid Marnie Stern has returned bolder, brighter and stranger than ever, an artist in complete command of her idiom. [Nov 2023, p.51]

Halfway through its flow, Gave In Rest reveals itself as her first sustained attempt--a successful one--at stranding listeners in a mellow darkness before taking them back outside. [Oct 2018, p.51]

The fit between Laurie Anderson and Kronos Quartet--whose list of previous collaborators includes Terry Riley, Steve Reich and Philip Glass--is so natural it’s almost a wonder they haven’t worked together previously. [Mar 2018, p.53]

They’re on fire here and now, reassuringly within that sound world you’re familiar with but – perhaps because the album is self-produced – sounding freer, looser and more magnificent than ever. ... A band who’ve clearly lost none of their miraculous touch with their sources, who incredibly seem to have an entirely new lease of life. [Mar 2023, p.60]