A to Z

On album six, APTBS are making a fresh start. There’s a new lineup, with Ceremony East Coast’s John and Sandra Fedowitz added, and they have their own new label. However, a new sound is not so forthcoming. The shadow of The Jesus & The Mary Chain still looms large (“Dragged In A Hole” perhaps a nod to the metallic screech of “In A Hole”) as they clatter around between shoegaze, industrial noise and scorched psychedelia. It’s familiar territory but there’s plenty to enjoy being pummelled by here, from the infectious and woozy “Let’s See Each Other” to the screeching yet strangely melodic “Anyone But You”.

DANIEL DYLAN WRAY

LA-based Adams edges deeper into folk-noir Americana on her third album, although these spine-tingling blue-velvet lullabies still display a lightly experimental edge. Partly inspired by a family bereavement, Metal Bird elevates personal tragedy into a poetic meditation on universal heartbreak and loss, earning Adams a place in the pantheon of woozy contemporary torch singers alongside Mazzy Star, Lana Del Rey and Angel Olsen. From the spartan melancholy yodel of “Blues Look The Same” to the lush string-couched waltz of “You’re Not Wrong” and the shimmering country-folk lament “Prisoner”, Adams radiates a chiaroscuro fatalism that belies her youthful years. Delicious desolation.

STEPHEN DALTON

The freewheeling eclecticism contained within Alt-J’s shape-shifting sound means these erstwhile Mercury Prize winners remain something of a cult concern as album four drops. And if few concessions are made to mainstream mores here, it still works on its own idiosyncratic terms. There’s an infectious, stop-start funk to “Hard Drive Gold” as Joe Newman’s vocal flirts with falsetto, after the exotica-flecked, world music-influenced lo-fi groove of “U&ME” further doubles down on a proudly singular bric-a-brac approach to pop songwriting. Barbershop vocal harmonies, psychedelic chamber acoustica, gothy synth-rock and ambient sample further muddy the waters elsewhere, but you sense they’d lose interest if life ever got any simpler.

JOHNNY SHARP

From his debut 33 years ago, Alright It Was Frank…, Texan Thomas Anderson has long taken compositions to new heights, mixing uncanny storytelling with poetry. Here, jangly guitar riffs lead into monster narratives: the life of Adolf’s sister in “Paula Hitler Wolff” and her need to sell her soul for a piece of meat; lifestyle unlimited in “Bad Storm In The Oil Basin”, rhythm and rhyme binding up every verse. The eight-minute “Suzette And The Lucky Pierre” is a songwriting coup d’état – think family, grandma’s house, acid and prison.

LUKE TORN

It feels like an increasing anomaly that Animal Collective’s blend of experimental pop, New Age grooves and fractured melodies were once a dictating zeitgeist force. Now removed of such fanfare, and perhaps pressure, they seem more content making idiosyncratic wonky pop on the fringes. There’s a cohesive assuredness that radiates from this record that previous post-2010 ones have missed. “Prester John” (one song by Avey Tare blended with one by Panda Bear) is a breezy yet irresistible piece of art-pop reminiscent of Another Green World-era Eno. While tracks like “Cherokee” take a gently pulsing and melodic groove and expand it into something quietly euphoric, before dipping happily back into quieter, odder moments.

DANIEL DYLAN WRAY

The point where The Slits and The Fall meet Slapp Happy and the , Bas Jan do high-art pop on a low budget, their violin-heavy second LP another showcase for the untogether brilliance of Jarvis Cocker collaborator Serafina Steer. Ovid’s “Heroines” goes pop on “My Incantations, Herbs & Art Have Abandoned Me” and good intentions are subtly undermined on Steer asks herself, but for the gloriously diffuse musical polymath, staying slightly out of focus remains a superpower.