It sounds like a dog howling over a Sepultura record. No, worse. It sounds like Fred Durst.

It's a clever, chic and defiantly underground record, alright, but it's guilty of trying too hard when clearly it doesn't need to.

An attempted retread that feels more driven by commerce than conviction and suffers as a result.

As unremarkable and average a comeback as humanly possible.

This album contains unprecedented levels of female vocal annoyance.

See, there're a good few cracking singles on here, but there are also occasions when her wistful classicism leads her down blind alleys.

While a few get close, not one remix here stands up to the original on 'Guero'.

MSTRKRFT have essentially made an album of great productions and remixes and then forgotten to invite any artists or records along to help them out.

Alas, 'The Cost' is closer to the Noughties ipoddery of 'sensitive' folksters like Damien Rice or James Blunt than a Fleetwood Mac or a James Taylor.

The lack of a linear structure results in the individual songs banging against each other logjam-style, with the unfortunate effect that 'Fab Four Suture' begins to grate.

However essential it was to make, it just doesn't feel essential enough to keep on hearing.

This has little future funk, but lots of Swizz beats-styled Casio Rap and contemporary chart dancehall. Which is lame.

Think Pavement with a shake of Grandaddy and a little dash of something else low-key and lackadaisical and that's Quasi.

Obie is, underneath all Eminem's bullshit, a nice emcee, old school, so when Em gives him a beat with some soul, he comes through.

And so it goes on sonic cliche after awful lyrics after terrible synth settings after lazy drum beats after... well, you get the picture.

They have made this album many times before and one assumes they will make it many times again.

The sad thing is, even at her most mainstream, Bjork's always been truly artful, but, in this case, she's merely painted a vulgar picture.

Many of the choruses are great, but by about track eight you begin to realise this isn't about songs, this is about mathematics, and if you've actually paid for the album with your own money, you've been well and truly had.

Lyrically, things are mainly annoying, although there are a few bits of amusing storytelling, and some interesting couplets.

Repeated listens draw out its infinite flaws, its awful smugness, and remind you that were this not A Radiohead Album it would have been consigned to the pile marked 'Not A Patch On Aphex Twin' last week.

'Baby 81' sees a band lose focus from what made them tick in the first place.

If 2004's 'A Ghost Is Born' was an experimental step too far then 'Sky Blue Sky' finds a band regressing tamely in to Dad-rock. Wilco need to rediscover that middle ground that suits them so well.

Too much is sodden with his overbearing ego.

Listening casually is OK, as you can get by the annoying Pharrell and enjoy some of the silly retro groves. But pay any degree of actual attention and there are problems.

'In Your Honour' is as rancid and moribund and as redundant of ideas as it is possible to be.

Far too often, 'Wiretap Scars' feels limp, lifeless, bereft of dynamics.

This record is more riddled with more clichés and pure, retro water-treading embarrassment than anything [Courntey] Love ever conjured up.

Too much of it is straightforward four-to-the-floor anodynity, and a number of tracks run out of ideas almost immediately, explore touchstones they've caressed more inspiringly before or, worse, do both.

Hugely disappointing.

After listening to the whole of this album we'd have to admit that Pole remains as much of a mystery as ever. Only now we're not sure we're still interested in finding out much more...

It was possible to ignore Schnauss' new age leanings previously but they're rammed home mercilessly here making too much of this album sound like Enya-period Sigur Ros.

While there's some fresh experimenting and choral loveliness, it sounds formulaic and tired by Electrelane's standards.

For someone so traditionally dancefloor-driven, there are none too many grooves here, and, even for an artist whose most famous lyric may be "la la la", there's not exactly a lot to go on in terms of substance.

That the band that churned out some of the best records ever made in a phenomenal two-year creative splurge should be reduced to anything as pubby as this is nothing short of tragic.

The Neptunes have lent their Midas fingers on production duties, but they've gone their schmaltzy route rather than into party bangers mode.

Even on repeated listens, the search for the showy dazzle of The Killers, the lyrical tomfoolery of the Kaiser Chiefs or the sheer stadium smartness of Franz Ferdinand proves fruitless, and it becomes apparent that, in an age where indie's proving to be the stronghold of overachievers, 'Cuts Across The Land' may have missed its moment.

A weak Meth album produced poorly and without imagination in the main, by an assortment of losers, with each track featuring a guest emcee.

While there are some moments of greatness (the menacing, psychedelic 'Dog Sleep', the mournful, pretty 'Don't Cry That Way'), the majority of this double album is dull, turgid and instantly forgettable.

This album is bollocks. Not the bollocks, mind, just plain old fashioned middle-American bollocks, the sort of 70s, vaguely psychedelic-tinted, vaguely funkdefied bollocks that Lenny Kravitz and old school MTV made their own.

'For Screening Purposes Only' reeks with the all-pervading whiff of vapid irony.

Now we see. It is all clear. DMX believes what they say in Def Jam board meetings. He actually believes that what Mr Budden and Just Blaze did earlier this year is what one should do in hip-hop right now - meaning, shout popular thug slogans over irritatingly OTT beats for an hour or so.

The problem is that I Created Disco goes on for nearly an hour and barely changes tack once.

Disappointing, frustrating and exhausting, 'Astronomy For Dogs' finds a band trying too hard to cram too much into one sitting.

A collection of rehashed moments from his brilliant though patchy career, a sowed together patchwork of pastiche.

Such is the reliance on his voice to provide resonance both melodically and lyrically, there isn't a great deal else to fall back on should the listener find it objectionable.

Staunch fans won't be disappointed, but it's hard to envisage new ears pricking up on hearing 'Octopus' woeful musings.

This album, if it came from a newcomer, could kill a career stone dead.

There is no New here.

There's definitely something horrid, hairy and horrendously hippyish hobbling these lovely boys.

'Crazy Itch Radio' bumbles along with mid-paced beats and, it seems, too many disparate influences to really hold together.

While 'Bleed Like Me' is easily better than 'Beautiful Garbage', it's still not worth buying. It's recognisably Garbage, but it's unarguably garbage too.

Former admirers, be warned that 'Without Feathers' will send you into a headless, flailing flap; while any newcomers to The Stills will be left with a plump, bald turkey on their hands.

All too often the guitar-led tracks expose their limitations.

Badly Drawn Boy's been sketchy before, but never quite this artless.

There are too few ideas here to really make 'Keep On Your Mean Side' worth our devotion.

The trouble is, the much-lauded braggadocio of 'Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not' is hollow.

Resembles nothing more than a U.S. major label executive’s idea of what dance music should sound like.

They've got better stuff in them, we believe, but, meanwhile, 'The Power Out''s strictly a forty watt affair.

An unholy brew of overreaching ambition and soul-destroying complacency.

Despite occasional thrills, for all The Twilight Sad's epic ambition and admittedly accomplished sound, this is a hollow record that struggles to fully transcend its influences.

There is little to recommend here.

This hack-job (bish-bash-boshed out by uberproducer Stephen Street) takes all the bland, tawdry, white-bread bits from the past two Suede albums, butters them up with a smear of Bon Jovi balladeering, chews them into gloop with nicotine-stained, plastic dentures and... well, ends up flushing a once-great career straight down the in-at-number-16-out-the-next-week toilet.

The problem is, whilst the debut had more hooks than a fishing rod sandwich, this just doo-wop-yawn, the sort of nursery rhymes kids never remember.

With the ability of the participants, surely there could have been more interesting material to explore, and sadly 'The Brave And The Bold' ends up being anything but.

It's as if they're trying to mimic Primal Scream but on ‘Let’s Make History’ they’re more like an under the weather INXS, and on ‘Armed Love’ you could even draw comparisons with Ocean Colour Scene. Eeeeeeeeee!

It's a rather sad indictment that by the end of the album you almost forget its The Stooges gainfully toiling away.

It took U2 10 years to reach this level of blandness.

A Victorian freak show with a cracking voice, but just a few stolen Prince and Stevie Wonder tunes, Har Mar Superstar seems to be humiliating himself and reaching for the lowest common denominator in search of lays and some fleeting personal success.

If The Delays had succeeded in making the latter five-sixths of their debut as wondrous as the first portion, they could be credited with fair miracles.

Timbaland has revealed himself to be a crass, stupid, venal prick who is pretty much talentless outside of production for other people.

Startling for all the wrong reasons.

Supporters have argued that this is " a perfect comedown album". In the sense that you'll feel like you're coming down even if you haven't taken anything, yes.

There are many more interesting artists out there doing the kind of thing Jamie does with more panache and originality with voices that don't make me want to throw myself under an underground train, but they're not from Wimbledon.

'Lions' is a mediocre album.

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

An album of repetitive, insipid riffs: eleven tracks flakier than chippings and more irritating to your facial passages than toxic MDF sawdust.

A rather predictable and mundane package.

As welcome as emphysema.

What once felt like maverick defiance on the part of the 'Shop now leaves them looking directionless, with Tjinder sounding increasingly like an unattractive combination of smugness and bitterness.

An album of dull, vocal virtuoso ballads.

So there are a couple of standout tracks, and the rest falls on its arse.

You can smell the impotent melodic desperation a mile off.

A very slickly produced record that's practically unlistenable.

This air of superiority is pervasive on 'Our Earthly Pleasures', which is a pity when you consider contemporaries such as Franz Ferdinand can do clever without it getting in the way of the fact all they're really doing is making good pop records.

There are no great ideas, or stunning movements, just ego-driven mush set to chocolate box arrangements. Oh, and a tendency towards the kind of vocals that Pink Floyd or Chris Rea might have been proud of.

Seriously poor, lowest common denominator bullshit.

If this was the work of a new artist it's debatable whether it would even have seen the light of day, and it's certainly unlikely we'd've felt the need to even comment on it.

So while Hamilton Leithauser believes he's made a record comparable to the legendary 'The Basement Tapes', it seems almost churlish to point out that you'd be far better off digging out a copy of 'The Basement Tapes' and listening to it, than going out and purchasing 'A Hundred Miles Off' and listening to it once.

Not even the added muscle of playaz like Kid Koala, Afrika Bambaataa, Plug 3, Prince Paul and Mike Patton manage to lift this album above the low level pastiche it seems happy to be.

Kaiser Chiefs have absolutely no talent or taste for innovation.

It feels like a mix-tape or compilation, an in-joke or doodle between the participants rather than a completed work for public consumption.

This is a dog of an album, by anyone's standards, but if you play it next to 'If You're Feeling Sinister', which we did, then it is the sort of dog that shits all over the kitchen and has constant mange.

While their political musings... are well intended, the lyrics are so heinously bad and the music so incredibly earnest and bombastic, you're tearing it out of your CD player after five or six tracks.

Someone should put Blink 182 out of their misery.

About as boring as a record can be.

Finds her flailing club-footedly some twelve steps behind contemporary R&B, whispering distractedly through a seemingly unending array of interludes and phoning in songs that even Mariah at her most barely-there would dismiss as a trifle on the insipid side.

Lyrically, he's got one thing to say: Kid Rock is back, Kid Rock has lots of money, Kid Rock has the dames licked down, Kid Rock is hard. Which is all good when done properly, with wit, but Kid Rock is not clever, and he's not funny.

How anyone can describe Leeds' The Music as a "best new band" is beyond me. Unless they're over fifty, sport a footballer's perm and weep at Almost Famous.