Ben Schumer

It's difficult not to feel that something essential and elemental to The Walkmen's aesthetic is missing from most of Heaven

Tramp ups the game on both fronts—her songs have a newfound bravado, and her crushing heartache has become tempered with acceptance and understanding.

There are moments of minor success (mostly in the first half), but these are moments that rely the least on samples, retracing some of Returnal's dark, boundless, ambient journeys.

The talent was there but they seem to have needed a strong hand to push them in the right direction.

Several tracks do reclaim some of Björk's past glory and inspire a bit of wonder, but the majority of Biophilia meanders weightlessly into space.

The songs on Skying are dense, towering, and occasionally overstuffed.

Imperfections and all, 4 shows that Beyoncé is willing to defy expectations and embrace her eccentricities. In doing so, she has crafted her most personal and affecting album to date.

In many interviews over the last several months, the Drums’ lead singer Jonathan Pierce repeatedly stated that the band’s debut LP would consist of relatively “darker” songs and be more of a “winter album”. These statements were presented as a comparison to the band’s debut EP, Summertime! (truth in advertising if it ever existed). So, here we are… it’s summertime again, and guess what? The Drums is melancholic, but not “dark” or “wintery” in the slightest. All things considered, it’s another summer album.

Like the rest of the band’s catalogue, there is an underlying current of hope and an inextinguishable lust for life on Fall Be Kind. These things are not always explicitly expressed in the lyrics. They are often felt in a dramatic drum crash, in the way Portner and Lennox’s vocals support one another or even in particularly soothing wash of amniotic sounds.

Gorilla Manor is a solid and promising debut, but it can come across like it was all conceived by an algorithm designed to mine and and refine indie rock's most fashionable trends.

xx is a thoroughly cohesive, moving and accessible album. This young band of Londoners exhibits a level of maturity, artistry and potential that far exceeds their years.