26 September 2026
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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Self-produced album from the Tennessee garage punk artist noted for his profilic singles output
7.0
Surprisingly well sequenced, Fall closes with its longest song, “There Is No Sun” (3:49), where the chorus bursts open like a 1967 Liverpool summer dawn. Reatard’s urges are old-school, which also can mean classic Read Review
Every now and then you come across an album that makes you say, without hesitation, this is going to be—or at least, ought to be—huge. Watch Me Fall is one of those albums. Read Review
A taut, sinewy masterclass Read Review
Reatard may not be for everyone's taste, and some tracks do find him coasting along, but it's an album bursting with confidence and energy. Read Review
He has found his musical voice on Watch Me Fall, and while it may not be the best album of 2009, it’s certainly one of the most enjoyable. Read Review
Neither a reinvention nor a holding pattern for Reatard-- walking the line between them is tricky, but he continues to make doing so look easy Read Review
There’s a weakness to this stinging hoard of glam tragicomedies. For all its coherence musically and in the persona presented by Reatard, Watch Me Fall doesn’t have any sort of arc as an album Read Review
There isn't an actual bad track on the disc: some numbers pack lyrical refrains and hooks that pierce the brain, but even the ones that don't have an interesting musical flourish or two. Read Review
Leaves something of the garage-punk edginess behind, and replaces it with ironically happy music, and an altogether more mature feeling Read Review
There's a case to be made that when you've heard one you've heard 'em all. In practice it's like opening a packet of Haribo - before you know it you're a dozen down Read Review
It’s an acute exercise in power-pop, with Reatard’s Cheap Trick fancies making for a helter- skelter burst of enthusiastic songs with a knockabout charm to them. Read Review
Print edition only
Jay Reatard: Watch Me Fall
Blondshell Violins
This is an artist widening her frame without losing her bite. It’s confident, a little wistful, and often loud in all the right places Northern Transmissions
On her third album, Sabrina Teitelbaum fights to strike a balance between savage beauty and jagged home truths NME
Everything great about Blondshell is present on ‘Violins’, but it feels sharper, more adventurous and more assured then ever before Clash
LA alt-rock singer Blondshell trades plain-speaking lyricism for something more abstract, while Irish rock band Gurriers cut through the noise with their ambitious second album The Independent
While trying to find and assert herself, the song has her imagining walking down the aisle to Beethoven's Für Elise, even though no one, including her, would pick it as a wedding song All Music
An often-delicate inward vision that pairs frustration with beauty DIY
It's in her ability to take the everyday experience and turn it into an epic noise that Violins finds its sweet spot The Line Of Best Fit
It would be unfair to call Violins Blondshell’s finest work to date, given the strength of her previous albums. What’s clear, though, is that it’s every bit as good as what came before Under The Radar
Protomartyr Hotel Usona
The album is more eerie in tone than its predecessors, like a distant alarm sounding, trying to amplify the sounds we cannot hear Northern Transmissions
It’s a bleak listen, sure, but Protomartyr haven’t ever been the comforting types. In fact, they’ve chosen the perfect time to double down on their righteous anger and despair, and if everything were to come to a catastrophic end right now, you’ve got the perfect soundtrack for it Far Out
For newcomers, it's a perfectly moody entry point. Hotel Usona is the sound of a band settling into their own skin, creating a space that's uniquely theirs and generously sharing the key Exclaim
From singer Joe Casey’s handmade album artwork to drummer Alex Leonard’s impish, kinetic inversions of classic post-punk rhythm, the Detroit band crafts an austere, unflinching record as bleak as it is cathartic Paste Magazine
This is not a hotel you'd want to stay at any time soon, but it's a remarkable record to spend time with. Print edition only Uncut
Under dim hotel lights, Casey’s lyricism appears foreboding and alien in a way it never has before The Line Of Best Fit
Ezra Collective Here Because of Hope
Arguably the biggest jazz band in the country return with an album that shows off both their exuberant and more reflective sides musicOMH
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
Rosalía Lux
Kendrick Lamar Damn.
D'Angelo And The Vanguard Black Messiah
Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds Ghosteen
Spiritbox Tsunami Sea
Self Esteem Prioritise Pleasure
Hayley Williams Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party
Bob Dylan Rough and Rowdy Ways