The Mountain Goats’ music has reached new levels of complexity, as well as quality, and that Darnelle and co have enough imagination and capabilities to take their music in any direction that they wish.

The abilities and inventiveness of the two musicians bridge all the possible gaps here and do reach that “liminal state of mind” that the duo was striving for.

Krok is an album that offers quite a few delights, both “old” and new.

Jamie’s songwriting has a substance that firmly holds things together here, and instrumental and vocal help from guests like Josephine Foster make things (darkly) intriguing throughout.

It is just one of those (late-night) albums that you simply don’t care if you understand a single word of the lyrics; it just works in every way it should.

It all might sound like a bit of a strange mix, but it turns out that Cohen was able to turn all the varied influences, or rather varied ideas, into a very cohesive whole.

It seems The Necks have developed a tight empathy and a set of tight instincts, with the three musicians involved always being able to sense where each of them is going, making their runs shift with full sense and logic.

The quality of music Charlie Bruber presents on ‘Prized Burden’ just might not keep him in the musical shadows for much longer.

Fifty and some years after its original release back in 1971, it still sounds as timeless as it did then, with the new remaster extracting some additional nuances that might have been missed the first time around.

Under the influence? Certainly, but both the influence and its take here are quite great, thank you.

The results are nothing less than thoroughly imaginative and mind-bending, and you can put any genre label you wish to describe it.

It is Dalt’s creativity and inventiveness that are to the fore here, with the emotional element leading the way.

Saint Etienne conclude their studio recording career with yet another big bang they used us too, with hope that they just might change their mind at some point.

Under the detailed musical embellishments, the listener is able to fathom the concept and the dark tale it is presenting. A thoroughly intriguing album that simply should not go unnoticed.

While the connection with some old masters could be clearly drawn here, there is that current songwriting and production touch to this album that makes it both familiar and brand new at the same time.

Sherwood was able to gather a brilliant crew that was able to execute his musical ideas to a tee, making this album an excellent experience for both devoted Sherwood fans and those who have barely heard of him.

Throughout the seven soundscapes presented here, Tucker firmly remains in the enchanting space, leaving all the mundane traps easily behind him.

She’s Green play these familiar sounds both effectively and gracefully, but they do shuffle them around in a manner that makes that sound quite their own and oh so appealing at the same time.

Gerlach tries to make a detailed sense out of it all and comes out of the process with quite some flying colours, skipping the now standard algorithm music discovering system, making it quite a personal one.

What we get is music that is not only suited for a specific time of day, or a tea ceremony for that matter, but something you can play at any time, along with anything you can drink.

Throughout, Mamode presents the inventiveness of somebody like Tricky when he is fully focused on creating music.