Lower Dens have the right ideas for their music, but they’re not always the right ideas at the right time. This album, flawed as it may be, is still worthwhile for when the latter happens, like with the heated guitar work and wailing vocals of ‘Two-Faced Love’.

Though it’s not surprising that Iggy included a couple of left hooks, it hurts a little bit that the album doesn’t have more of the sing-speak poetry and post-rock dreaminess. He does it so well, but only about 22 minutes are dedicated to this sound. ‘James Bond’, in contrast, is a distraction from a compelling new direction.

Among the 21 tracks of Close It Quietly there is plenty that is amiable and whimsical, pleasant and inoffensive. There is also, however, almost nothing affecting or memorable.

Lost Girls is fundamentally disappointing. It is an album devoid of originality from an artist who should be reaching for the stars instead of looking back into the murky past for inspiration. No doubt it will sell by the bucketload, but then people like Coldplay and voted in the Nazis so what do they know.

Black Belt Eagle Scout has crafted an album to play any naysayer: At the Party with My Brown Friends will make a fan out of anyone.

It’s clear that with Venus in Leo, HTRK have taken a step higher, using desolation to their advantage. With an eye for detail and fondness for obsessive downward spirals, they have made their first album in five years comfortably fitting of their sensual and aching mystiques.

What has changed is that this time around is that she swapped out the usual 8-track recorder she usually used to lay down her vocal parts and instead recorded them with producer Arthur Rizk in an actual studio. Far from distilling any of the fury from her pipes (which sometimes sound on the verge of shredding themselves) the added clarity does a lot to boost the emotional wallop of her words especially on the more vulnerable moments.

Devour is the first Pharmakon album which was recorded live in the studio, and there is a sense of organic creation to it which is pivotal to the ideas layered within. The warmth of the production separates this album from her previous three, perhaps even suggesting a sense of hope for humanity in the face of overwhelming odds which are stacked against us.

Right now, it can feel like every artistic statement is part of a grand commentary on our collective entropy. Joan Shelley plays on all of our nostalgia for calmer days. Her latest album is great shelter from the gathering storm.

The majority of Fear Inoculum’s songs are more or less interchangeable, achieving the same overall effect in slightly different ways. ... Toolheads will find much to enjoy here, I am sure of it.

With each album Snoh Aalegra shows progression. From Don’t Explain, to FEELS to this latest release, Snoh has taken parts from previous releases to create this record whilst keeping her authenticity.

Jay Som is truly at home on Anak Ko, and it shows. It may not pack a wallop, but it's always welcoming, and, sometimes, that's just what we need.

With more than enough flagrant energy to satiate the average punk, The Murder Capital—still—is most affecting through its delicate and understatedly sad musings on life and death. In fact, the rest of the record sees the band tap into poetic introversion that is both broad enough to latch onto, yet intimate enough to impress your own experiences and fears.

By no means is Infest the Rats’ Nest the best ‘heavy’ album of the year, that honor is shared by Lingua Ignota and Baroness. But it’s not crazy to suggest that Infest the Rats’ Nest is one of the most valiant efforts of 2019, one that has only furthered the wondrous mystery of Melbourne’s beloved band.

Their newer, glossier pop sheen pedestals them as the makers of proficiently written and intently catchy tunes that are inoffensive and innocuous - and never adventurous enough not to be.

Put simply, Animated Violence Mild is an excellent album which is imbued with righteous vitriol. This isn’t just the best Blanck Mass album to date, it’s also the best record that Power has been involved in, which really is saying something.

Concerns over the band’s changing sound are summarily squashed under the furore of their zipping forward with the energy and heft of a dozen motorcycles.

Dwyer’s band are still the masters of genre-leading and genre-defining garage-psych-founded mayhem but Face Stabber veils that slightly behind bloated long cuts and a lack of standout individual tracks.

i,i is an album meant to please their least demanding customers; a session of pure, light nostalgia, and given the band’s rabid following, it’s still certain to succeed, even to receive knee jerk, overeager accolades. That’s all well and good, but it’s hard not to recall just how much more these guys are capable of.

Passionate vocals and gritty guitar-driven melodies brings the album to life, reminding us of the reason the band have been successfully taking the industry by storm.

With his charisma and creativity at the core of these songs, and an incredible group of collaborators around him, Ty Segall has created an album that will appeal to both long-term listeners and first timers – just like pretty much every one of the other studio albums in his increasingly legendary discography

File under: Works better if you think of it as a remix album.

Cuco might not convert naysayers this year, but he clearly isn't overly concerned. He's delivered an easygoing, often charming set of songs, and that's a mission statement fulfilled.

Midsommar may offer limited mileage when it comes to daily listening. Still, it accomplishes its goals with deadly conviction, and for those with a penchant for unnerving listening sessions, you may just discover a dependable companion here. It's a nightmare to linger within.

Too eerie to be a comedown album, too scary to be a soundtrack, Kiri Variations is rich in weaving a tapestry of Wiccan ideals, of woodlands and innocence and dreams of suffocating entrapment, which combine to produce an album of unsettling pleasure.

By turns distant and unknowable, fleeting and eerie, and even serenely gorgeous, Apollo found Eno continuing to toy with, and reach for the edges of, a sound he himself perfected. ... The album stands out of time, never ageing, forever seeming to beam in from a future just out of reach. Much like the event it memorializes, forever there may it stay.

Whether he feels every emotion he’s describing or is putting on a mask, the songs remain enjoyable and lighthearted.

King’s Mouth has moments of pure joy and feels timeless in many ways, and for that Coyne and co. should be applauded.