This is one of those rare albums that makes you wonder how you ever got by without it.

Burial has concocted a noir-ish sound that’s as powerful as it is atmospheric.

In Rainbows really does present Radiohead at their most full-blooded and confident.

An album as rich as it is strange.

An ambitious, filler-free, modernist-sounding beast which laughs in the face of underachievement.

There are missteps... and the production is sometimes frustratingly muddy, but Neon Bible very nearly delivers on impossible expectations.

M.I.A. and co-producers, including Switch, straddle more styles than you’d find in most music collections, let alone on the same disc.

This is music that hits the head, heart and hips all at once.

The songs on Comicopera rate amongst his very best--emotionally complex, politically charged but never short of beautiful.

While their sound might have progressed in an even more bizarre – if sadly less atmospheric – direction, it's still surprising, full of invention and totally unique.

Bewildered newcomers will soon be entranced, old fans won't be disappointed.

Upon starting Soft Bulletin--you’re instantly whisked off into the universe the Flaming Lips have created. The musical journey that ensues is nothing short of imaginary genius--simple as.

At 77 minutes it’s no sprint, but YLT’s mellifluous serpentines are never less than involving.

[Finn's] smart, poetic, unashamedly adult lyrics... almost guarantee this is the best arena band that’ll never play an arena.

It’s to her great credit that Newsom (literally) plucks artistic triumph from the jaws of cloying whimsy.

Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga sees Britt Daniels channelling his persecution complex into more piano-driven 60s pop songs, screaming "Don't make me a target!" at the heavens as his girlfriend walks out. His band prove surprisingly versatile.

The result is a folk album so rich and intricate that, in scope, it's comparable to Van Morrison's "Astral Weeks."

It’s a winning combination, with the Prince’s shambolic charm still intact but lent clarity by the new additions that make this infinitely preferable to previous efforts.

It's perfect for passing down the crown of Malian desert blues.

This is not a bunch of old blokes looking to recapture their youth; rather, Grinderman sounds like a freshly hewn and rudely vigorous chunk of leftfield rock.

It’s exciting stuff, simple yet deadly effective.

Turner’s sharp narrative ear is still tuned to the revealing banalities of everyday life, the whole band admirably responsive to emotional nuance.

The lyrics are often sublime, of course, but there are big, stupid choruses too.

It’s a step backwards for sure, but a worthwhile one.

Love Travels At Illegal Speeds is good stuff that doesn’t drive you round the bend. It doesn’t pack any surprises either.

Warm and quirky. Pleasantly bizarre. Sophisticated and daft. Herbert at his best.

Ward’s band kick back with a looser, rockier feel than previously, yet his dusty, wistful voice still inhabits an age all of its own.

While still lush in its own grimy way, Ruff Draft represents the harsher, more experimental end of Dilla’s palette.

Has some moribund slumps.

The subject matter takes them closer to Nick Cave than ever before, yet, whereas he displays a knowing black humour, Low’s earnestness sometimes makes them unwittingly hilarious.

Not all of Dangerfield's maverick ideas work - he should steer clear of under-accompanied singing for a start - but when they do take off, Guillemots really soar.

This will end up flying off the shelves for sure.

Much of Hissing Fauna… dances in the face of its depressing subject matter.

Filling the gaps between Prince and !!!, this is for those who spent the last two decades shaking their hips rather than banging their heads.

There are off-centre, post-hardcore workouts and plenty of edgy but polished, pop fusion pieces, which suggest The Futureheads transplanted to 70s West Coast America.

The new album conjures something of Condon’s own imagination, more deftly-etched romantic fiction than dry travelogue, and is all the better for it.

This Japanese power trio possess a lurking sense of Metal traditionalism, producing a scabrous wall of guitar noise, crunching, dense and turgid.

The album’s dark title belies its artful balancing of psych pop’s sweetness with head-down, rock riffing and the emotional power of the blues.

A complex yet controlled fourth album of astonishing beauty and perfect strangeness.

A textbook lesson in sublime but understated country soul.

Don't expect the gumption of Super Furries, instead bask in the mellow psychedelic ramblings of Gruff unplugged.

Even by her own unsettling standards, however, her seventh album is disturbing, a collection of smudged and spectral laments that appear to have been written before the invention of penicillin.

His vivid, scattershot rhymes are clever without being cryptic, and his techno-tinged beats never veer off into tuneless arhythmia.

If there is such a thing as music with a hairy chest, this is it.

This only occasionally matches the breathtaking splendour of last year's …Illinoise! but with its modest price and immodest extras only Scrooge could fail to have his heart warmed.

El-P's uniquely, beautifully harsh vision remains undiluted.

Shorn of the orchestral lushness that distinguished their previous effort, The Dears now have little to recommend them.

Coming in 2007 it sounds oddly fresh, but nothing here’s as full-on as their early stuff or as lovely as Feel The Pain.

Heartfelt but sometimes overly polite.

The influences may be antediluvian but the spirit is timeless.

Lyrically, Allen spins the street-slang tales of blowjobs and booze told with varying success by everyone from The Streets to Shampoo.

Short answer: it’s good.

Their second album continues in a similarly delicious vein, melding wonky electronics, pillow-soft soul and lyrics that manage to weave strange violence into gorgeous soul songs.

Even the most melancholy moments... have airy jazz arrangements that let them breathe.

The production is smoother, but when Sleeping Lessons morphs from an opiate dream to a riffing stomp with such exhilarating economy, or Red Rabbits wraps drunkenly swaying strings around yet another firmament-bound chorus, you can forgive an occasional excess of slickness.

There’s gold here but you need to dig deep.

Five albums in, The Coup have just made their best since their debut.

Together, they’re a marriage made in musical haven.

When Cease To Begin rocks out it's euphoric, but there's a mournfulness shadowing each of these insistent melodies that will have you crying even as you smile.

It’s not just the recurrent meditations on mortality that makes Ma Fleur even more heart-rendingly beautiful than 2002’s Everyday, it’s also how The Cinematic Orchestra’s new album actually feels.

There's a real richness here, and raw venom beneath any fey first impressions, as gentle finger-picking bursts into free-jazz fuzztone guitar blasts and bloodied lyrics.

Frank is an honest, refreshingly personal record which, though very occasionally strays into easy jazz, has Gucci bags of personality.

Now every track is an intensely creative pop gem, like those brilliant pockets scattered throughout previous releases, refined and condensed.

Excellent Italian Greyhound is vintage Shellac: stark, razorous and blackly comic, lurching into whatever time signature happens to possess drummer Tod Trainer.

Possibly their best and certainly most joyously eclectic album yet.

No doubt fans’ll love it, but virgins shouldn’t expect to swoon at this end-of-the-pier jamming.

The result is less cohesive than Vespertine or Medulla but the fun’s in the exuberance, the jolting between musical styles.

The first few tracks work a treat, melding glitchy beats and stomping brass bands in the best tradition of Björk or Sigur Rós. After that, however, things start to feel a bit overwrought.

The Go! Team are clearly committed to the lo-fi, DIY aesthetic, but with songs as strong as these it’s rather a shame they didn’t apply a little depth and finesse to their production.

The Eraser’s sound lies somewhere between the roiling beat soup of Amnesiac and a poppier sensibility.

It's a bewildering jumble on first gaze, but Harte's little fingerprint-smudged slivers, so lovingly composed, are precious things, and you'll fast find yourself addicted to his sweet, glum love stories.

A welcome reminder of the Brummie art-poppers’ lighter, brighter past.

Their debut has a great deal of shadowy appeal: there are lyrics about ghosts and secrets, set to drowsy washes of guitar.

This is a beautiful record; so wistful and reflective when it finishes it’ll make you feel instantly nostalgic.

Though it still errs toward a languid late-60s template, Cabic’s songwriting is now crisp and effortlessly melodic.

The Loon owes so much to Stephen Malkmus and Frank Black that one imagines lawyers might be called.

Having eschewed the over-earnest knob-twiddling of erstwhile producer Steve Albini, Verity Susman’s vocals and Mia Clarke’s guitars now sound crisp and urgent, and when the envelope gets pushed... the band’s detached cool melts into a pleasing joi de vivre.

Sensuous, subtle but emotionally overwhelming dreamscapes, whose luminous beauty makes pigeonholing nigh on impossible.

The confessional micro-detail of Darnielle’s minimal indie-folk songs – and haunted whine of a voice – remains stoically unchanged.

If you’re after dark, bloody romance with a twist, look no further.

Raymond Raposa, the ex-surfer behind the ever-shifting line-up, sounds like Neil Young after spending a few nights on a park bench, his decayed folky croak the perfect thread to link these hushed laments.

Don't let the seductively pleasant drift of the tunes fool you: this is sharp, dark stuff.

Whatever the permutations, Amiina's fragile magic can't fail to beguile.

A cannily considered, thoroughly de nos jours mix of punk, skiffle and music hall-bred power pop which fizzes with energy and affects a brash charm, but adds little to Barat’s and Doherty’s original blueprint.

The best thing about Garden Ruin is the way they look beyond country borders to engage with the wider world, both culturally and musically.

This is cathartic, psychically haunted fare; pleasing and troubling in equal measure.

Despite flashes of unexpected vigour, Everybody is ultimately more variation-on-a-theme than it is wheel reinvention.

Just Like… is no classic, but it’s enough to make for a teary goodbye.

A less angular, more grown-up album - something that won’t rattle your nerves.

It's Christmas come early, and None Shall Pass won't disappoint his fervent admirers.

A more straightforward affair than previous works, and as such suffers from predictability.

As exciting as it is original-sounding.

Meek Warrior’s seven tracks form a sprawling tapestry where every guitar pluck, clarinet wail or joyous shout seems part of some euphoric cosmic plan.

This is woozy Americana wrapped fast in thick swathes of serrated menace.

Good Bad, Not Evil delivers 13 testosterone-crazed grooves which mercifully give finicky revivalism the swerve, in favour of fuzz-frazzled sonics and lots of fun.

It’s a fun mess, and although heavily indebted to 60s psyche folk and acid rock, Astronomy For Dogs has a verve and colour that saves it from derivative pastiche.

Give it a bloody good stereo and your full attention.

The bubbly cartoon funk of single Cell Phone's Dead is a winner, but tracks like 1000 BPM and We Dance Alone are mid-paced, cautiously funky numbers with neither the bare sentiment of Sea Change nor the ribald lunacy of Hansen’s late-90s bombs.