The precursor to Bowie's masterpiece, The Rise And Fall of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars, Hunky Dory points in many of the same musical directions as Ziggy, with Bowie camping it up outrageously through a mixture of cabaret piano, coquettish lyrics and soaring vocals. After the hard rock "The Man Who Sold The World", Mick Ronson's guitar is turned down in favour of plenty of piano and acoustic guitar, as Bowie proves his mettle as a masterful singer-songwriter. Not a dull note is struck on the whole album, which flits from opener "Changes" to the vampy "Oh! You Pretty Thing" to the heart-wrenching "Life On Mars" with a seemingly impeccable ear for a tune. Flirty, sexy and irresistibly seductive. -Amber Cowan.

The third album from the most successful of all the bands to spring from the New York punk scene, Parallel Lines is perhaps the definitive Blondie album. Produced by pop svengali Mike Chapman, it epitomises the astute mix of new wave chic and pop sensibility that spawned four hit singles from the album, and gives Debbie Harry's voice a platform of sleek professional pop that it had previously lacked. "Hanging On The Telephone" is a driven, up-tempo gem, "Picture This" soars deliciously around blissful melodies, while "Heart Of Glass" flirts seductively with disco. And it's proof of the album's mettle that tracks like "Fade Away And Radiate" are just as impressive as the singles. -Amber Cowan.

Predictably, given the drug problems which preceded its release, Clapton's second solo album proper seems to come and go in an opium haze of its own making. Oddly though, it suits him. As the history of rock attests, if you're going to get into one hard drug then you may as well make it heroin. Whereas cocaine feeds the ego and destroys judgement, heroin sublimates it and allows the artist to regress into his music. Which pretty much describes where 461 Ocean Boulevard is at. Because tracks like "Steady Rollin' Man" and US chart topper "I Shot The Sheriff" sound like they have all the time in the world, they make light work of putting the listener in a similar frame of mind. Best of all though is "Let It Grow", for many the kind of tender, foetal balladry which finds Clapton at his most quintessential. Inevitably, he cleaned up his act and sporadically attained similar heights. But for sheer mood and sense of moment, 461 Ocean Boulevard remains his masterpiece. -Peter Paphides.

Considered an unprecedented magnum opus when it arrived on two records in May of 1966 (1997's Time out of Mind is actually only about a minute shorter), Blonde on Blonde featured Dylan continuing to demonstrate remarkable powers over the course of 14 new numbers. Working in Nashville with session men and a few conscripted recruits (Al Kooper, Robbie Robertson), Dylan continued to bend minds with his warped lyrics and phrasing. Even dashed-off numbers such as "Obviously 5 Believers" and "Rainy Day Women #12 & 35" contribute to the crazed, fun-house ambience. Dylan will never be this wild again. -Steven Stolder.

Four years is a dreadfully long time to wait for an album from anyone, let alone a man renowned for his fierce independence, who could no doubt make an acoustic guitar weep merely by stepping into an adjoining room. But finally, the long-awaited follow up to the quietly inventive and universally-acclaimed O arrives. And those who have followed the evolutions in his live act since 2002 may be surprised to hear that there is such a seamless transition between that album and 9. His sophomore record offers affirmation rather than progression, but what a rewarding set it is regardless; gradual and accomplished. It's hard to contrast too intently with past work when each song demands such focused immersion from the listener. Full band pieces such as the perky and most conventional "Rootless Tree", the rattled Jeff Buckley-esque riffing of "Me, My Yoke & I" and the eventual explosive climax of the brilliant Radiohead style ballad "Elephant" are noticeably cohesive, but his real strength remains alone with his broken, weighty voice and soft, tentative steps down his piano keyboard. "9 Crimes" and "Sleep Don't Weep", both enhanced by the angelic fortitude of vocalist Lisa Hannigan, are immediate highlights. And "Accidental Babies" is heartbeat-stealing in its lonely beauty, the kind of private counsel you would happily wait years for. -James Berry.

With their second album, Infinity on High, Fall Out Boy walk a fine line between emo darlings and American rock gods. The clever, angst-ridden outcast lyrics are still there (as on "I'm Like a Lawyer with the Way I'm Always Trying to Get You Off"), but this time around they display a cockiness that unusual for the scene that gave birth to them. And it's not just in the borderline godlike hubris of album title Infinity on High, it's also present in the surly album-opening statement from Jay-Z ("We dedicate this album to anybody who said we couldn't make it. "). But often, this self-assuredness works to their advantage. Musically, this is a much heavier and punchier album than its predecessor, and vocalist Patrick Stump sounds better than ever (aside from those rare, ill-advised uses of a vocoder). And they're willing to play around with their sound, as when a string section and mandolin add a dark-edged atmosphere to "Thks fr th Mmrs", or the horn arrangements on the album's epic highlight "The (After)Life of the Party" and "I've Got All This Ringing in my Ears and None in my Fingers". All this grandeur may not be in keeping within the punk ethic, but Fall Out Boy have left most of their punkier roots behind on Infinity on High and taken the first steps towards becoming a great American rock band. [+]

Lauded singer-songwriter Richard Hawley (a former touring guitarist for Pulp, no less) made his commercial breakthrough on 2005's remarkable, Mercury Prize nominated Coles Corner - his fourth solo album and one that oozed nostalgic balladry, old fashioned lyrical sentiment and cinematic soundtracks in equal measure. Lady's Bridge - the name is yet another ode to his native Sheffield - mines the same seam as Coles Corner, with 11 eloquently charming songs that switch between the romantic strains of opener "Valentine" and "Roll River Roll" and more uppity numbers such as the rhythm & blues infused "Serious" and the countrified twang of tracks like "Tonight the Streets Are Ours" and the Johnny Cash inspired "Dark Road". Hawley's lyricism retains its coruscating, retro feel, his vibrant baritone again matched to rousing orchestral strings, climbing chord sequences and background harmonising, creating atmospheres of dreamy fireside warmth and heartfelt melancholy (see "Lady Solitude"). It's as hopelessly alluring as it sounds: when songs are this timeless, you really could listen to them for the rest of your life. -Paul Sullivan.

Inevitably, when critics praise a new Dylan album, they label it the "best since Blood on the Tracks," and with good reason. Inspired by a crumbled marriage, and recorded after a tour with The Band had apparently re-ignited his creativity, Blood is among Dylan's masterpieces. The album's epic songs are well known, but its real high points are the shorter numbers-"You're a Big Girl Now", the flawless blues "Meet Me in the Morning", and the sweetly devastating "Buckets of Rain". These are songs of "images and distorted facts," each expressed through tangled points of view, and all of them blue. -David Cantwell.

One need hear only the first notes of this collection-the Edge's ringing guitar notes ushering in "Pride (In the Name of Love)"-to be taken back to 1984: Ronald Reagan and Maggie Thatcher rule the Western world, the L. A. Olympics is the top sports story, and Ms. Pac-Man reigns at arcades. In rock & roll, there's U2 growing in stature with each new tour and title. Even doubters of the Irish lads have to concede that together they formed the one '80s band with the skill and sense of scale to take over the airwaves and concert stages in a decade of diminished expectations. This 15-song '80s best-of assortment (stick around for the hidden track) spans the decade, reaching back to 1980's "I Will Follow," when Bono and company were peach-fuzzy and earnest as choirboys, and tracking their path through their universal domination with 1988's Rattle and Hum. -Steven Stolder.

Songs in the Key of Life was the highest high-point of Stevie Wonder's career. More sprawling than Innervisions and Talking Book, this 2 LP-plus-EP was also less of a consistent stunner than either of those masterworks. That Songs retains an enormous amount of visionary relevance, though, is demonstrated not only in Coolio's borrowing of "Pastime Paradise" as a template for "Gangsta's Paradise", but in the cold-as-ice synthesized string quartet of "Village Ghetto Land". This is Stevie, so naturally that cut's anger is balanced by the ultra-buoyant "I Wish," "Sir Duke", and "Another Star". -Rickey Wright.

Pretzel Logic marked a transition for Steely Dan from a studio-bound rock band producing hits such as "Reeling in the Years" and "Do It Again" to a looser constellation of studio musicians under the direction of songwriters Walter Becker and Donald Fagen. That later version of Steely Dan would paint its masterpiece with Aja. Pretzel Logic is much more playful than that, and also jazzier than the albums that came before. The jazz intentions are made perfectly clear on "Parker's Band", a swinging tribute to bebop titan Charlie Parker, and a crafty cover of Duke Ellington's "East St. Louis Toodle-oo". The lyrics displayed their own twisted logic, presenting a tumble of images in search of a unifying principle that most often remained elusive. Steely Dan was that rare act that could work such purposeful obscurity to its advantage: "Rikki Don't Lose That Number" was a top-five hit even though nobody had a clue as to what it was about. Or, perhaps, everybody had a clue, but nobody could agree. -John Milward.

The style known as "anti-folk," as realized by practitioners like Ani DiFranco and Billy Bragg, is derived from a punk aesthetic, and thus tends to be spare and confrontational. But while Regina Spektor's music is anti-folk in the way it subverts the traditional coffeehouse vibe, it's less interested in rebellion and more concerned with the joy of eccentricity, melody and surprise. Begin To Hope is full of surprises, and like her promising major label debut Soviet Kitsch, it displays an easy facility with song structure that enables her to go in different-sometimes wildly off-the-wall-directions without sounding scattered. Classically trained on the piano, she's been compared to Tori Amos, but her music isn't as delicate or precious. Fiona Apple comes up as well, but just because neither fits in the usual female singer/songwriter cookie cutter mold doesn't mean they sound the same. Her voice is actually the primary attraction, cracking and loopy on would-be lullabies like "On The Radio" and "Field Below," then punchy and cute on "Hotel Room. " But the music, if understated in the mix next to her vocals, makes an impression as well, breaking in with twisty piano arpeggios ("20 Years of Snow") and occasional touches of electronica. It's a consistently intelligent and daring record, yet remains enormously listenable-a neat trick for anti-folk, or any other genre of music for that matter. -Matthew Cooke.

In the liner notes of Sloe Gin, emerging guitar great Joe Bonamassa explains that one of his objectives is to experiment with acoustic elements he first encountered while listening to Rod Stewart's earliest work. "I think the heavy blues and acoustic mix well together," he writes, and the inviting variety of the disc's 11 tracks-from the rousing electric rave-up of the title track to the closing, tabla-propelled acoustic instrumental-persuasively underscores his point. Bonamassa is a major talent with a growing following, and as his fan base inevitably expands it may become difficult for him to keep everyone happy. Hardcore blues devotees no doubt will yearn for Bonamassa to stay perpetually plugged in, but in the long term that would be a disservice to his broad range of skills. Bonamassa rocks formidably and convincingly on "Dirt in My Pocket" (a bristling original composition), the title track (well suited for air guitar), and his Clapton-esque rendering of John Mayall's "Another Kind of Love. " Yet his softer works suggest that he sounds a little more comfortable and natural-vocally, at least-on the acoustic tracks. His retooled version of "Around the Bend" (his first take on this original composition is found on an earlier release) is an engaging, pastoral gem, and his paean to his upstate New York home ("Richmond") is perhaps this disc's most memorable selection. Bonamassa knows the blues (at the time of this release, he was the youngest member on the board of the Blues Foundation), but he also knows how to rock and how to sagaciously, artfully ease off the gas. -Terry Wood.