Whether they’re running away from or towards something is anybody’s guess, but crucially, Tumor remains one step ahead of the rest.

Neither a disaster on the level of their iTunes launch, nor a triumph to match Zoo TV, Songs of Surrender sits somewhere in the middle of that sliding scale of success.

There’s a naturalness and a flow in evidence, and charm, too. You can’t imagine anyone who rushed to the download sites was disappointed with what they found.

It’s utterly transfixing – not just for the gorgeousness of the tone, but for the absolute wondrousness of the melodies.

Past//Present//Future suffers from a sense of sameness – compact or not, the songs eventually blur into one mass of pop hooks and distorted guitars.

Karol’s skill is in evocative melodies that transcend any language barrier.

Here Uchis couches her velveteen mood pieces in pillow-soft R&B, creating a suite of songs luxuriant enough to bathe in.

Ugly is an album that carves out its own space: messy but vital, it deserves to be huge.

This will be too much of a standards-like set for some, maybe – but even if Mehldau the solo pianist has had to trade rock’s muscularity for a chamber-musical delicacy, his power isn’t far beneath the surface.

Divorced from cartoon alter egos, big concepts and Albarn’s apparently limitless power to persuade big stars to do his bidding, it reveals itself as that most prosaic of things: a fantastic pop album.

[Seven Tears] builds gently, then feverishly, shivering with love. This whole album carries the same liberating feeling throughout.

An eclectic grab-bag of ideas that achieve varying degrees of success. When it hits the mark, you can understand why pop stars and left-field figures alike have been drawn into Skrillex’s orbit. But taken in one dose, it’s alternately exhilarating, frustrating and a little exhausting.

Over 40 minutes, it refines the sound of Pigs x7 and highlights the band’s strengths – presenting an unsparing induction into their mind-bending sonic vortex.

It’s not perfect – the title track is seven and a half minutes you might better use boiling eggs – but it is its own small wonder, as every Yo La Tengo album seems to be.

This Is Why stirs 00s alt-rock into the mix: the band have mentioned Bloc Party and Foals as influences. It’s not a combination that works without fail: there are tracks where the teaming of scratchy guitars and big pop hooks recalls the moment when the post-punk sound of 00s indie crashed into a Britpop-ish desire to make the BBC Radio 1 A-list, with irksome results – particularly on the single C’est Comme Ça. But you’re far more frequently struck by the deftness with which they weave the various aspects of their sound together.

Flamboyant on stage, behind the scenes he sought out, and achieved, a quiet, stable life. If that sounds boring, you should hear him sing about it. It’s not very rock’n’roll. It’s a lot more interesting and enduring than that.

My 21st Century Blues roars into life, hitting you with one fantastic song after another.

Luxury and gratitude are fine motifs, but without enough sonic distinction between tracks it gets boring fast.

You wish you got a bit more of the Sam Smith who was recently photographed for a magazine wearing goth-y platform boots, sock suspenders, tight blue satin shorts and an Abba T-shirt. They looked as if they didn’t care what anyone thought. It’s hard not to long for music with that attitude.

Playful, painful and loaded with hooks that worm their way to the surface, Honey feels ripe for bleak midwinter wallowing.

He’s abundantly talented, a singular and austerely powerful voice. But as Rap Game Awful proves, abundance can be a problem.

What Rush! lacks in heft – a couple of glancing lyrical references to sexuality and gender notwithstanding, not even Måneskin’s loudest cheerleader is going to claim it as a weighty album – it makes up for in enthusiasm. If that enthusiasm occasionally tips over into a cloying eagerness to please (Supermodel is a little too desperate to remind listeners of Smells Like Teen Spirit), more often it’s infectious.

Strays brilliantly rattles through country, psych and Patti Smith-style poetic rock’n’roll.

Although Space Man’s co-writers contributed to several other tracks, that song’s elegance is nowhere to be found among a litany of cliches and self-help guff so toothless it makes Ed Sheeran look like Nick Cave.

Moving far beyond the cotton-soft folk of her previous records, with Prize, Plain chooses to lean into her eccentricities – and the risk pays off.

Every Loser’s main flaw is that you’re left wanting more.

Coheed have been heavier and more forward-thinking than on Vaxis I, but they’ve never released an album with so many tracks primed to become hits. Rarely has almost an hour of sci-fi mumbo jumbo been easier on the ear.

These are beautifully elegiac songs, celebrating life’s transient joy, struggle, laughter and heartbreak, reflecting the fact that “sometimes the good die young, and sometimes they survive”.