In their quest for paper, The Roots have lost their way.

A patchy, flawed effort.

KW's album can only be thought of as even remotely good while we don't have a young, hungry KRS One, RZA, Rakim Allah, Gift of Gab or Ol Dirty Bastard to challenge him.

Despite its many wondrous moments, 'Feels' is not a record for everyone.

It is undeniable that they can produce beautiful sounds with their equipment, it's just that they do not seem to be able to orchestrate it to any purpose afterwards.

It's painstakingly layered and often lush, but sometimes scrubby and miserably sparse.

They actually sound like they've elected to live in a cocoon full of aromatic candles, a huge collection of musty records, some drugs, some books, and a collection of mid eighties Peel sessions alphabetically labelled on TDK C90s.

'Love' is trying to be all things to all people and suffers for its lack of ruthlessness and direction.

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

About as disappointing a follow-up as you could ever imagine.

Whether this is an album that actually suits them is another matter, but it actually makes them feel entirely relevant and, for as prolific a decade-old band, that’s high praise indeed.

'Panda Park' is a strange record, though whether you think it's any good or not depends on your tolerance levels.

Most of the time 'Lowedges' is so laid-back in Hawley's well-bedded-in, Fifties crooner way, it almost buries itself.

Not, perhaps, the hugest of leaps from 'The Noise Made By People', granted, but that album, fine though it was, was very much parking on specific continental territory; 'Ha Ha Sound', by contrast, feels like it wants to explore somewhere more bearingless.

Interpol prove themselves to be men on a mission to take us back to a time when long faces and even longer overcoats were de rigeur for alpha males the musical world over.

Whereas previously his songs felt carefully and beautifully crafted, here he seems content to merely plunder a whole host of archaic musical styles and immerse himself in self-congratulatory jams, and a result you end up with a less than satisfying hotchpotch of songs.

This is a rather stronger record than [Daft Punk's] on the whole, even if it likewise suffers from flaws in execution.

This is no whimsical, fey take on folk music, rather a bold, buoyant frug with the skeletons of The Doors, Teardrop Explodes and other likeminded explorers of the stoned side.

The sonic palette here is just so relentlessly perfect that, for me, it becomes constricting and cloying.

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

I usually find Shins albums grow on me slowly but surely yet after a good dozen plays I feel my faith isn't being repaid this time, and as a fan that's frustrating.

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 much to get teeth-grindingly irritated about with this album.

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

Too often tracks drag us down below the high standard an artist like Beck Hanson has set himself. Red Hot Chili Peppers outtakes with some harmonica and vocoder balanced incongruously on top are frankly not good enough.

'Cassadaga' is much less of a draining emotional journey for both chief player and listener alike than Bright Eyes previous work.

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

There are moments of brilliance here, sure... but there are a few too many weak skits and a few too many weak tracks here to make this anything other than a mildly cool summer thang, and summer is, like totally over now.