Tune-Yards
Better Dreaming
After the introspection of recent records, Merrill Garbus and Nate Brenner’s sixth LP sounds refreshingly unburdened, with a newfound focus on jubilant vocals and danceable beats
Pitchfork
Stereolab
Instant Holograms On Metal Film
In an era when so much politically aware music feels either performative or joyless, Stereolab have made something far more valuable: a record of moral seriousness and emotional openness, a reminder that the world we want is already stirring in us
Under The Radar
Sparks
MAD!
With almost 30 albums under their complementary but not quite matching belts, Ron and Russell Mael show no sign of slowing down or stagnating. MAD! doesn’t surpass their recent works but neither does it repeat them; a plateau of sorts, perhaps, but an extraordinary one
Spectrum Culture
Sports Team
Boys These Days
The London indie cult heroes swap the mosh pit for old school pop and country-tinged rock on a typically satirical third album
NME
Sparks
MAD!
MAD! is ‘just another’ adroit, bold, clever, distinctive, epigrammatic, fascinating, groundbreaking, highbrow, inventive, jocund, kaleidoscopic, lowbrow, maverick, nonconformist, observational, piquant, quizzical, ravishing, smart, tough, unconventional, versatile, witty, xenodochial, youthful, zeitgeisty Sparks album
Record Collector
Sports Team
Boys These Days
A sharp, funny, and sometimes sobering soundtrack to young adulthood in freefall
XS Noize
Stereolab
Instant Holograms On Metal Film
With the advantage of time and progressions in the scene, as well as the reassurance that their identity will never be forgotten, it is strange and ultimately disappointing Stereolab wrote such a tame record
Northern Transmissions
Car Seat Headrest
The Scholars
The Scholars is less a statement than a constellation. And somehow, it ends not with despair – but with a small, persistent light. A door not just cracked open, but propped wide
Beats Per Minute
Sparks
MAD!
This is an album full of Mael-isms, so really, if you like that, then you’ll like it. But they’re Mael-isms weakened by time, lacking the bite and thrill of the band at their very best, as cruel as that feels to point out when it comes to Sparks
Far Out
Stereolab
Instant Holograms On Metal Film
This is highbrow music for lowbrow times, and it dances interestingly on the precipice of that interplay in a manner you can’t even begin to understand
Far Out
Stereolab
Instant Holograms On Metal Film
Stereolab return with their first album in 15 years and bring a political fury beneath their sophisticated pop grooves
Evening Standard
Stereolab
Instant Holograms On Metal Film
Motorik grooves, Marxist critique and vintage synths – in their first album since 2010, Lætitia Sadier et al pick up where they left off yet sound more timely than ever
The Guardian