1 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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Ninth studio album from the reformed Yorkshire alt.rock band featuring original members Ian Astbury and Billy Duffy
6.2
Absurd, brilliant and stupidly good fun. Print edition only
This is the true spirit walking. Print edition only
Choice of Weapon is the Cult's finest moment in 23 years; it's the true swaggering heir to the period that birthed Electric and Sonic Temple Read Review
The Cult continue to thrive by sticking to their basic muse, and they are showing pretty much no signs of rust Read Review
While the pomp and sense of urgency may be gone from the band's '90s heyday, this is a solid effort and a worthy choice for rock fans who want something loud to drive fast to Read Review
Déjà vu riffs and Ian Astbury’s hard-rock shaman voodoo are still great, but the weapon tends to misfire Read Review
Musically, it largely follows on from Sonic Temple. The songs are kitted out in leather trousers and cowboy boots, yet somehow echo the spirit of The Doors without being po-faced Read Review
Strikes a requisite note of defiance. Print edition only
Without any standout songs to propel it, Choice Of Weapon may be a return to style, but it’s not a return to form Read Review
What is missing, and what has been missing since Electric, is the groove to match the swagger Read Review
Ultimately The Cult have delivered an album of simplistic background rock, with a few redeeming moments Read Review
Fails to wash away the sense of redundancy that has hung around for too long now Read Review
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The Cult: Choice of Weapon
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 Virgin
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
On the uncomfortable paths of the 28-year-old’s fourth album, slam-dunk bangers are substituted with reinvention and restraint surrendered through hushed, reflective, and carnal synth-pop vestiges Paste Magazine
The New Zealand pop star chips away to reveal her purest self on her fourth album NME
For Lorde, it's an opportunity to reclaim something she thought she had lost long ago, but has always been within her: her true self Exclaim
Frankie Cosmos Different Talking
Different Talking introduces some novel elements to the Frankie Cosmos sound, but despite that, their core identity remains intact Spectrum Culture
U.S. Girls Scratch It
Musically Scratch It will probably be the least memorable in U.S Girls’ discography and aside from ‘Like James Said’ and ‘Bookends‘, the relatively thrill-less album does sort of fly by unnoticeably, made worse by the weak closing track No Fruit God Is In The TV
Lorde may not break entirely new ground on fourth album Virgin, but its warmth and texture make it consistently compelling and quietly brilliant The Skinny
yeule Evangelic Girl Is A Gun
A sun-drenched pop album — perhaps the pop record of the summer Under The Radar
The album is a hesitant step in the right direction for the singer Slant Magazine
Virgin is Lorde at her best yet as an affective poet and, frustratingly, at her most tamed as a digital sound designer The Line Of Best Fit
The New York band’s sixth LP feels like a scaled-up team effort. The newly expansive sound suits Greta Kline’s hard-won self-knowledge Pitchfork
Lorde’s fourth album returns to the digital, physical sound of Melodrama. While rooted somewhat in her past, it’s a gritty, tender, and often transcendent ode to freedom and transformation Pitchfork
Her fourth album celebrates the messiness of being human – and is also her most compelling and revealing musicOMH
BC Camplight A Sober Conversation
It’s perhaps the finest release of his career from start to finish, and that’s beating some stiff competition Far Out
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