James Blake

If, at most, this album is a testament to encyclopedic impulse, to mathematical soul, then, well, Blake is so good at so much that it, at its best, can start to resemble the product of intuition anyway.

A compelling and hugely promising debut.

Using lo-fi digital techniques to play up rough edges and raw emotion, Blake’s rare talent is to make music so naked seem unshakable.

James Blake's musical alchemy matches the beauty of Massive Attack.

Haunting debut from post-dubstep pioneer.

That an album as adventurous, exciting and challenging as this receives so much attention is a reason to be cheerful.

Silence never sounded so spine tinglingly good.

London singer-songwriter attempts to annex the middle ground between Benga and Anthony Hegarty.

Like fellow minimalists The xx, Blake takes from dubstep an awareness of space and silence; he appreciates the power of a perfectly weighted pause.

James Blake's debut is not an easy listen, but it's exactly what modern pop needs

A combination of traditionalist songwriting and avant-garde sonics is what makes the album such a compelling listen.

Every single note here does what it’s supposed to do, and despite all the album’s strangeness (it could genuinely be said to create a whole other world for its listeners to get lost in) and the amount of time it needs to have an effect, it’s true to Blake’s philosophy.

This album will inevitably disappoint those who had their hopes pinned on Blake producing the definitive instrumental dubstep masterpiece.

It’s every bit as challenging, forward-thinking, and interesting as those previous EPs.

U.K. dance music subgenres don’t usually produce soulful singer-songwriters ... But in James Blake, the squish-grooved London club throb called dubstep just got its very own emotive song stylist.

In the end, this is another decent full-length debut from a fresh face. Blake could give his contemporaries a real run for their money in the future, but I'm sure many a reviewer will tell you he already is.

Blake's voice and poetry strain to take us anywhere we haven't already been with more experienced inner-space travelers at the helm. Furthermore, his music has become inexplicably ponderous and static, at times seeming to stop dead in its tracks and not move forward at all.

Such a pioneer, in fact, as to come second in the BBC's Sound of 2011 poll. Which is not to criticise James Blake for that misplaced approbation, there being some decent moments on this debut album.

The highs are notable. The problem is, Blake has put himself in a tight box, and when he strays out of it the material wavers.

The rest of the tracks are more like exercises in sound manipulation and reduction than songs. The approach is no fault, but Blake pares it down to such an extent that the material occasionally sounds not just tentative but feeble, fatigued.

Elsewhere Blake’s silences don’t weigh as heavy as he thinks they do, and 'James Blake' is too calculated an act of daring to really shine.

Boldness, you realise, is not the same thing as greatness, and James Blake is not a great album.

Devoid of effects, echoes or electronic eeriness, his quivering timbre is exposed as maudlin, his lyrics trite.