4 July 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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Mini-album from veteran Manchester indie rock band who reformed in 2007
6.4
Consistency is easier to achieve on a smaller palette, it’s true – but consistency is nonetheless most definitely achieved here. These are sophisticated but accessible songs, exciting, moving and subtle Read Review
One of the strongest efforts of their career, combining the idiosyncrasies of their Factory/Rough Trade period with the big choruses of the 90s stadium era Read Review
James are back with something to say Read Review
It's good that one of the most underrated bands of the last 25 years are still producing such fine material Read Review
James is like trying on an old pair of glasses; it’s all blurry at first, but soon everything is clear. Bring on the next EP Read Review
A Runrig/Deacon Blue with a new-age gloss, their own tribute band, James live to blight another day Read Review
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James: The Night Before
Kesha . [Period]
. isn't just a good album, it's a decisively great one, full stop All Music
Following an experimental phase and a long-gestating split from RCA and Kemosabe Records, Kesha resumes her interest in party pop with a spirited sixth album that’s unfortunately littered with lazy, obnoxious, and dated songs Paste Magazine
The singer seems torn between unruliness and introspection Slant Magazine
The record pleasantly showcases Kesha’s impressive vocal range, emotive delivery and riff performance, but the final song is a spark that serves to highlight the unevenness of the album Beats Per Minute
The American singer re-introduces herself to the world on her sixth studio album musicOMH
After a long legal battle, the pop star’s sixth album harks back to her 2010s era, with a buffet of pop styles and only rare hints of her highly-publicised trauma The Guardian
The pop rebel’s first album as an independent artist, (Period.), has a wild try-anything spirit Rolling Stone
Lorde Virgin
Because for all the grand ideas here, it feels like Lorde has more to say about them, and as the aesthetic and songcraft of Virgin illustrates — almost despite all of this — she is more than skilled enough to do so Beats Per Minute
Frankie Cosmos Different Talking
Different Talking feels like Frankie Cosmos finally coming into its own. By self-producing, the band articulates a broader sound palette than on 2022’s Inner World Peace Northern Transmissions
A thrilling comeback that puts Lorde’s trajectory to the stars back on track DIY
Haim I quit
It’s easy to wonder if the soft-rock trio’s fourth record would be better if it were just a few songs — or, ideally, about 10-15 minutes — shorter Spectrum Culture
Hotline TNT Raspberry Moon
By opening up the recording process to accommodate more people and more ideas, Hotline TNT embrace a different side of themselves on Raspberry Moon, one that feels warmer and more open-hearted while still retaining the fuzz and noise that made their early albums so bracing Spectrum Culture
U.S. Girls Scratch It
While Scratch It lives up to its aged influences, Remy gives these nine tracks an undeniable immediacy, both with her singing and lyricism — which are eerily left of field — along with her spot-on taste in backing musicians and homage-motif Under The Radar
Loyle Carner hopefully!
The sounds are slightly different here than on previous albums and his tentative sojourn into singing is a success because his voice connects as easily as his rapping does Albumism
Lorde trades in her secrecy and mystique for a tremendously healing, desperately relatable record that cements her mark as her generation’s defining artist Northern Transmissions
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