17 October 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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Soulwax All Systems Are Lying
What marks out 'All Systems Are Lying' most obviously is the presence of Laima Leyton’s vocals The Arts Desk
A vibrantly textured, shapeshifting, and inquisitively diverse return DIY
Displays plenty of the turbo-charged, New Order-ish electro-pop traits of their best work Record Collector
While there's not much depth to the lyrics on the Dewaele brothers' latest album, when it sounds this good, who cares? The Skinny
Soulwax has always been great at eroding the lines between rock and dance music, utilising and harnessing the power of the riff in an electronic context. This continues to be forcefully apparent on tracks like "Idiots In Love". Print edition only Uncut
It struts with confidence. Print edition only Mojo
Sudan Archives The BPM
A dizzying, frenetic collision of sound and vision The Skinny
At 15 tracks, The BPM is rather too much of a sensory overload, but this is enthusiasm in context. Print edition only Uncut
While the concept means Parks' violin takes a backseat, it makes for a dizzying, future-facing hybrid of dancefloor sounds. Print edition only Mojo
Perhaps it's the vulnerability at the core of THE BPM that really makes what Sudan Archives is doing still feel so fresh. Standing out in the club music scene, it sets a new standard for anyone interested in playing with sound while maintaining an accessible heartbeat Exclaim
The album pulses with the kind of euphoria that comes from letting loose on the dance floor Slant Magazine
Hannah Frances Nested In Tangles
Despite clearly having experienced and subsequently created a whirlwind, Frances proves that she is masterfully in control of everything she is doing. Play on, maestro – let the circus continue Far Out
The Last Dinner Party From The Pyre
It feels even more dynamic than the last as they lean fully into fantasy, going fully cinematic or even folkloric, but then switching it up again and again, combining pure poetry with modern references to Real Housewives Far Out
Deftones Private Music
The energy is infectious, the pace is relentless and frenetic, and the magic is constant, truly carving out a 'back to form' aura Punk News
Agriculture The Spiritual Sound
The instrumentation and sequencing, the fury and fragility. Whatever magical combination has coalesced to create this record, I’m all in. I can’t get enough of it. I’ve got a new band occupying that space in my mind where I know they can create special music and that makes me immensely happy Punk News
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
Spiritbox Tsunami Sea
Self Esteem Prioritise Pleasure
Bob Dylan Rough and Rowdy Ways
Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds Skeleton Tree
Frank Ocean Channel Orange