30 March 2025
Here's how it works: The Recent Releases chart brings together critical reaction to new albums from more than 50 sources worldwide. It's updated daily. Albums qualify with 5 reviews, and drop out after 6 weeks into the longer timespan charts.
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Ninth studio album and first in over seven years from the R&B artist featuring guest appearances from 21 Savage, Burna Boy, H.E.R., Jung Kook of BTS, Latto, Pheelz, The-Dream and Summer Walker
6.1
Usher’s ninth album is another impressive display of his endless charm and vocal chops. Thirty years into his career, the R&B icon still knows how to keep it light and throw a great party Read Review
The album hits its stride with a sequence of slow jams demonstrating that Usher is at the top of his game as a singer, still much more than a mere entertainer Read Review
The star’s sprawling, twenty-song LP is nostalgic and familiar as Usher leans into the past without making it feel stale Read Review
Lyrical foreplay isn’t exactly the singer’s strong suit on this throwback album full of percussive panting Read Review
‘COMING HOME’ competently portrays love as part Afrodisiac, part pulse-racing chase, part languorous and lived-in sensation Read Review
The album feels less driven by creative ingenuity or an aesthetic vision than by sheer showmanship Read Review
Vintage effects in the singer’s first album in eight years underline the degree to which he has been left behind Read Review
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Perfume Genius Glory
Consummate chronicler of 21st-century sensuality Mike Hadreas returns to his indie roots on a convivial seventh album stalked by death and desire The Observer
Lucy Dacus Forever Is A Feeling
Forever Is a Feeling closes, significantly, with "Lost Time," a song whose sparse-bulky-sparse structure emphasizes her regret at not saying those three little words sooner. In the end, she manages to subtly dramatize her music without betraying the quiet honesty she's already known and beloved for All Music
Deafheaven Lonely People With Power
The San Francisco band return to their black metal sound with guttural shrieks and blistering riffs The FT
Mumford & Sons Rushmere
A return to their inglorious past for the British folk rockers comes served with an extra helping of self-indulgence The Guardian
Destroyer Dan's Boogie
Frightening fates await the protagonists of Dan Bejar’s 14th album, but the mercurial Canadian’s perspective and lavish instrumentation are a reminder of beauty’s potential The Guardian
The Virginia songwriter gets lost in understatement on a loved-up album about her relationship with bandmate Julien Baker, shrouding sharp lyrics in shy melodies The Guardian
With nothing left to prove, he’s redoubled his efforts, and added another Everest to his catalogue Clash
A cacophonous exhibition of everything that makes Deafheaven so special, ‘Lonely People With Power’ stands resolutely alongside ‘Sunbather’, ‘New Bermuda’, and ‘Ordinary Corrupt Human Love’ as testament to the brilliance of a band that is quickly amassing an unrivalled discography of masterpieces Clash
On her new solo album, the songwriter and Boygenius alum makes an impassioned, all-in gamble on love. So why does the music feel hamstrung by caution and daintiness? Pitchfork
Following a divisively tuneful 2021 album, the California post-metal band returns to its signature sound on its sixth album. But these heavy, soaring songs also hint at unexplored terrain Pitchfork
Selena Gomez & Benny Blanco I Said I Love You First
Selena Gomez’s fourth album zooms out on her celebrity presence, zooms in on her personal life, and hints at happiness and conflict PopMatters
Playboi Carti Music
The Atlanta rapper's third album is a sprawling mess with a few too many unnecessary and forgettable features, but buried somewhere in its capacious 77-minute runtime there's a fantastic album trying desperately to claw its way out The Quietus
The endlessly inventive metal band mixes painterly lyrics, raw aggression, and earworm melodies on their best album yet Rolling Stone
Forever Is a Feeling is an album about endings, some happy, some bittersweet, some devastating. Nonetheless, everything ends, even art and even music Under The Radar
In any given song you might easily hear Neil Young, Philip Glass and Cyndi Lauper The Arts Desk
Since we've been around, that is. So, the highest-rated albums from the past twelve years or so. Rankings are calculated to two decimal places.
Kendrick Lamar To Pimp A Butterfly
Fiona Apple Fetch The Bolt Cutters
Spiritbox Tsunami Sea
Kendrick Lamar Damn.
D'Angelo And The Vanguard Black Messiah
Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds Ghosteen
Self Esteem Prioritise Pleasure
Bob Dylan Rough and Rowdy Ways
Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds Skeleton Tree
Frank Ocean Channel Orange