27 January 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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Experimental rock collaboration between American avant-garde sludge specialists and Norwegian progressive black metal band, recorded in one evening and worked on for four years
7.4
Those Sunn O))) long-hairs are finally following their bliss out the other side of the abyss they entered via that gaping tunnel on Monoliths & Dimensions' cover, and the able hands and sly smiles of Ulver, Rygg and O'Sullivan greet them with signature erudite adaptability across Terrestrials' note-perfect 35-minute brevity Read Review
Hypnotically cinematic. Print edition only
Extremity for extremity's sake is conspicuous by its absence Read Review
Terrestrials sounds surprisingly cohesive considering the project’s improvised roots and slow development Read Review
Perfectly reflects both Sunn 0)))'s impenetrably emotional dark heart and Ulver's expertly crafted senses of drama and dynamic Read Review
It is a magnificent noise that dares you to turn your stereo up to eleven, turn out all the lights and see if your sanity is still intact at the end Read Review
It's long, languorous and wonderful in its invention, with Ulver lending emotional heft to Sunn O)))'s wall of tone Read Review
Avant-metal titans join forces to terraform a whole new planet of sound. Print edition only
Infinite loops and surging crescendos constitute a psychedelic session more about melancholic beauty than foreboding. Print edition only
This might be the closest you can get to ‘new age’ while remaining a heavily-tattooed riff-worshipper Read Review
Terrestrials bolsters both bands' oeuvres Read Review
What Terrestrials does reveal about Sunn O))) is their amiability, their unique potential to bring the concept of Sunn O))), if not its distinct sound, to an album that really isn’t quite their own Read Review
Altogether different from normality, and further down the path towards minimalist orchestral experimentation than expected Read Review
Ultimately, Terrestrials works as a likable listen, a liminal play concerning the push and pull between dusk and dawn Read Review
A welcome merger between two insuppressable forces Read Review
A trio of absorbing driftworks Read Review
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Sunn O))) & Ulver: Terrestrials
Mogwai The Bad Fire
‘The Bad Fire’ might not cure your January blues entirely but it’ll at least provide a glimmer of hope to get you through the bleakest of months. All in all, an utterly enthralling 11th studio effort from these avant rock stalwart Clash
Rose Gray Louder, Please
The up-and-coming British artist shines on her vibrant, hedonistic debut album musicOMH
FKA Twigs Eusexua
Twigs’ third album brings club music into her sensual, supernatural world. It’s a masterful pop-star moment for the artist Pitchfork
On their 11th album, the long-running post-rockers open up disarming, uplifting new dimensions to their sound without veering too far from familiar paths Pitchfork
Saint Etienne The Night
Saint Etienne’s The Night has quite a bit going for it, but it sounds uncharacteristically forced, ultimately collapsing under the weight of its pretension PopMatters
There’s some sense of reconciliation going on between their earthier 90s sound and the synthy, spacey and sometimes poppier material that’s inhabited their last few records The Quietus
The Weather Station Humanhood
Whatever the influences at play, Humanhood works gloriously as a song cycle The Quietus
EUSEXUA is FKA twigs bizarre world-building masterclass The Line Of Best Fit
jasmine.4.t You Are The Morning
Even though the songs are painfully personal, they offer a wider hope. The world feels dark right now, but albums like this give promise that the dawn is coming The Line Of Best Fit
The experimental U.K. dance-pop artist wanted to “transcend human form” with her new album. She nails it Rolling Stone
This record boasts real emotional nuance among the unbridled passion. And to retain the power to surprise and delight when entering its fourth decade is something few bands can claim Under The Radar
Anna B Savage You And I Are Earth
Over gorgeous musical arrangements that feature contemporary Irish musicians and gentle guitar work reminiscent of Nick Drake, Savage creates an intimate, enchanted world, where footsteps are muffled by moss and magic — even the mundane sort — waits behind every tree Under The Radar
Eusexua doesn't just embrace the thrust of commercial dance, it subsumes it into the chromatic, honed prism of FKA twigs' artistry The Skinny
This is an album that seeks an otherworldly state of purity and perfection The Arts Desk
Mogwai may not be writing Happy Songs for Happy People, but in so thoroughly assimilating so many musical approaches, they’ve found a way to make massive, deranged lullabies that urge you to stay awake, ready to handle whatever life throws at you Spectrum Culture
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
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
Dave We’re All Alone In This Together
