The songs are pretty, the guitars are mellow, all complimentary and measured; dull, in other words.

There's a lot of tracks on this album that go a lot deeper than anything Jigga's ever done, but so what? They ain't gonna cut it as party jams. Well, except the party jams.

Aside from one or two bore-me-ups, this is an album of understated perfection.

Gruff Rhys is one of our most imaginative and original musicians.

Fierce and noble and fragile and genuinely moving, 'A Rush Of Blood To The Head' is a lovely furnace of searing goodness made by some wonderful contradictory bastards.

Yes, of course it's a touch on the pretentious-sounding side, and it's also one of the most remorselessly miserable records of the decade so far, but none of this should discourage you from embracing it wholly.

'Hate' is gloomy without being self-indulgent, and grand without being pompous.

Yes, it's the relentless energy, humour and versatility which makes this record stand out and apparently their albums are merely incidental compared to their stunning live shows.

This is a fragile, beautiful music, it all nearly falls apart and then flops back together.

It's not without fault; too many songs and too little variation between the tracks detract from unequivocal enjoyment. Much more of an album to admire, rather than cherish.

A curious, klezmer-infested charm.

This is anticon at their most approachable and reflective and should be filed on your shelf somewhere near Dosh, Boards of Canada and Arcade Fire.

A stealthy, smoking beast of a thing: hip hop with a British passport and dubplate roots, embroidered with wiggly, scratching sound effects and made-to-measure production.

It has the electric hot valve excitement of sixties garage rock, the stomping sexuality of glam and the amphetamined rush of punk rock all dusted down and mashed together in its fever pitch workouts.

'Fall Heads Roll' as a whole might not quite scale the heights of 'The Real New Fall LP', but there's no doubt that elements of it are up there with it.

This is a brilliant, visionary album and needs rewarding with units - MTV won't have the scoobiest what to do, radio programmers will freak, and hip-hop will, once again, move forward.

So few men have managed to touch our scabrous hearts in such a way. Cohen, Bukowski, Barrymore, Hulk, Waterman... Middleton, Moffat.

Giant mutant rats are running about the place with gasmasks and guns. Their eyeballs are electric red, firing lightning bolts of acid, spit and shit and blowing up the place and the furniture.

This isn't really a party record, more of a reflective, late night curled up on the couch with a loved one record.

It seems - for the first time, perhaps - he's made one out of love for the artform alone rather than with the added motive of letting off a little barely-suppressed rage or feeling he has scores to settle, either with the industry or himself.

Even after one listen it's apparent that 'Untouchables' is a monster of a record.

What "Happy New Year" really represents is Oneida's finest, most complete record to date, and as such it's the perfect starting point for anyone who's as yet unfamiliar with their rather daunting back catalog.

She might not quite have made it through the wilderness just yet, but she's chosen the most glittering road to resurrection she could find, and it's one she walks with no small smattering of style.

They no longer rely on dense production and atmospherics, because they don’t need to: ‘Antics’ is bare-boned and beautiful.

They've created a world of tender reflection encompassing engaging melodic cycles, pastoral textures, glitchy interjections, acoustic decoration, melancholic strings, loose, jazz tinged drums, lonely horns, yearning guitar laments and delicate vocals: All melded into ebbs and flows that form a coherent universe through songs which all have their own defining characteristics.

What's beyond doubt is the magical blend of the surreal and the fantastical that made 'The Unseen' so memorable is once again in the fullest effect on this showcase of fearlessly skewed production, dense organic vibes and hemp & helium-fuelled raps that make up this smoked-out saunter through the back streets of the cosmo-according-to-Lord Quas.

Anyone expecting any of the more experimental tangential qualities of the German group will be disappointed, as will anyone expecting intense lyrical workouts from Smith. Instead we have an extremely convincing whistlestop tour round current electronic music with a partially deranged, completely eccentric lexicographer raving brilliantly over the top.

Rabid Dinosaur Jr fans will find plenty here to enjoy.