After reaching their peak in the late 80s and early 90s with albums like Pornograffiti and chart-bothering ballads such as "More Than Words," American rockers Extreme seemed to deliquesce into the musical horizon, never to be heard from again. But 13 years later the band are back with a brand new album that re-treads their classic Queen-meets-Aerosmith "funky rock" schtick. "Saudades" is a Portuguese term for a form of nostalgia, usually for someone or something that you're missing - in this case, good old fashioned rock & roll. So they went into an LA studio and made some more. The original threesome-vocalist Gary Cherone, guitarist Nuno Bettencourt and bassist Pat Badger-teamed up with drummer Kevin Figueiredo to recreate a record that has all the hallmarks of their prior classics. Opening with the immediately contagious "Star" (which features some swaggering guitar and Queen-style harmonizing), Extreme barrel their way through funk rock ("Learn To Love"), catchy blues ("Take Us Alive"), sentimental ballads ("Ghost") and grunge ("Comfortably Dumb")-in other words, a little bit of everything. Cherone's vocals remains compelling and the band's mercurial fusion of genres is as tight as ever, making this a very welcome comeback.

Since 2002's jaunty Waiting for My Rocket to Come, Jason Mraz has developed into a more mature, well-rounded pop artist. We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things is his most multi-dimensional work yet, covering everything from groove-based material to ballads. While tracks such as "Make It Mine" and "Butterfly" refer back to the catchy style of previous albums, there are many other styles and textures on display here. His duet with Colbie Caillat, "Lucky," for example, explores his folkish, acoustic side, as does the compelling "Details in the Fabric," both of which are excellent songs. Mraz gets a little more experimental on "Coyotes," which toys with a clubby electronica and strangely seems to work, and on "The Dynamo of Volition" for which he employs a hectic, rapping-style of vocal over a typically contagious rhythm. His ballads, such as "Love For A Child", "If It Kills Me" and "Beautiful Mess" (these last two saved for the end) show a more sensitive side; and even when his lyrics are occasionally clumsy, Mraz manages to make his point in an emotive way. Easy-going and sunny, but with laudable elements of depth and innovation, this is Mraz at his best so far. -Danny McKenna.

Stereophonics' fifth album will inevitably provide more material for the band's critics, if only for the fact its title has clearly been rather lazily inspired from the back of a rental video case. The music within, however, is anything but laid-back: the employment of Argentinean drummer Javier Weyler, who replaces founding member Stuart Cable, sees the band venturing further along the hard-rock path that spawned previous denim-and-leather-clad tracks like "Moviestar". The first three tracks find frontman Kelly Jones is in downbeat mood, his vocals drawled and insouciant, and his lyrics distinctly sour-take the raging "Doorman", where he rails against some faceless bouncer with surprising and rather paranoid ferocity: "You like nothing more than to break my face/ You like to throw me out on the street!". Things sweeten towards the album's middle, providing two of the album's stand-out tracks: the chiming, electronic-tinged "Dakota" is a light, buoyant anthem that deserves to be a hit, while "Rewind" is a reflective moment that pricks memories of mid-period U2. But on the whole, Language. Sex. Violence. Other? isn't an album out to win new fans - it's an album that caters to the Stereophonics' rock faithful, and it's them who'll really dig it. -Louis Pattison.

After the massive success of Pablo Honey-or, more specifically, the single "Creep"-had made them a household name, most had written Radiohead off as one-hit wonders. That they could return with an album as awesome and monumental as The Bends, therefore, must have been particularly unexpected. Not that Pablo Honey is a bad album, but rather, when compared to the epic grandeur of The Bends, it's obvious that the five Oxford-based boys had matured immensely since the release of their debut. "High And Dry", "Just", "Street Spirit", "Fake Plastic Trees": nary a pop song among them, yet it's testament to their greatness that they all were hit singles. And really, it's easy to see why: Thom Yorke's falsetto crying over a wall of acoustic and electric guitars, as lyrics and music blend to create a masterpiece of melancholy beauty. The Bends is one of the most essential albums of the 1990s, and a spectacular indicator of further greatness to come. -Robert Burrow.

Even as the Beatles began heading toward an inevitable break-up, their prolific ways continued; this two-disc look back only skims the surface of their later achievements. Excerpts from Sgt. Pepper, Magical Mystery Tour, the white album, Abbey Road, and Let It Be compete for space with classic singles that do as much or more to prove their eclecticism: the epic ballad "Hey Jude", the plaintive "Strawberry Fields Forever", straight rock & roll of all stripes from the plainspoken "Revolution" and "Get Back" to the surreal "Come Together". Decades after the split, this (and its companion set of 1962-1966 cuts) remains a favoured introduction for young listeners and a key sampler for veteran fans. -Rickey Wright.

One of ZZ Top's great gifts is its concision; even in the side-long-jam era of the 1970s, the Texans almost always fit 10 cuts on their albums. Surveying two decades of their output, Greatest Hits isn't the perfect overview you might expect, but it's still a pretty darn good driving album. The disc goes easy on the pre-Deguello stuff surveyed on their earlier best-of, and seems to digitally boost the drums on tracks like the 1975 "Tush". Still, later cuts like "I'm Bad, I'm Nationwide" and "My Head's in Mississippi" are full-on triumphs of this trio's very weird, very blues-drenched sensibility. -Rickey Wright.

For better or worse, Phil Collins's "In the Air Tonight" was the "Stairway to Heaven" of the 1980s, winning radio stations' listener polls and even lending its designer threat to an episode of Miami Vice. Hits recalls the days when the Collins name on a disc ensured its immediate embrace by programmers and the public. How you feel about these songs will depend on how you felt about them then; despite the undeniable niceness of "Take Me Home" and "One More Night", they're unlikely to win over anyone who didn't adore them to begin with. Those who cared, though, will no doubt be gladdened to find most of Collins's biggest tunes together on one disc. -Rickey Wright.

His career currently on a roll, Magic reunites the Boss with employees, the E Street Band and it is terrific-a highlight in a long and illustrious catalogue. Brash and noisy and a lot of fun, Magic is packed with great, thoughtful songs. The stately "Your Own Worst Enemy" sounds full yet eschews histrionics, the atmospheric "Gypsy Biker' has a strong melody to match, first single "Radio Nowhere" is an unlikely country-rock thrash and "Livin' in the Future" has all the swing of "Cover Me", but without the drawback of dated production. In fact much of Magic nails that old Phil Spector trick of cramming a lot of blokes (and birds) into a small room, and getting them to play simultaneously. Given that the E Street Band are big blokes these days, the effect is magnified. Not only does Springsteen successfully recapture a sound that once seemed exotic, the same can be said of lyrics such as "Girls in Their Summer Clothes" and "Long Walk Home", rueful and distant and all the more believable than the evocative yet lifeless mini-film scenarios he once specialised in. The Sopranos has redefined the image of New Jersey over the last decade (Bruce and band even pose like a mob in their clubhouse, especially Steve Van Zandt), but Springsteen has reclaimed local pre-eminence with this excellent collection. Pulling off the rare combination of excitement and maturity, the grown-ups are really having a good time. -Steve Jelbert.

With Absolution, size is most definitely an issue. Hoping that it will finally propel them into the musical major leagues, Muse have set out to create a cross-genre monster, a contemporary meisterwerk, the biggest-sounding album in years. That they almost succeed is testament to their sky-high confidence and unarguable abilities. With just three members to draw upon, they've individually stretched themselves to fill in the inevitable sonic gaps. Bassist Chris Wolstenholme, in particular, does sterling work, producing a driving buzz to lift "Time Is Running Out" to a massive crescendo, then a rush of distortion that pushes "Hysteria" to Queen-like levels of ecstasy. Throughout, Matt Bellamy adds classical grace with his tinkling, rolling grand piano, all the while moaning and shrieking out his fear of decay, destruction and death, like a traumatised Gene Pitney. Indeed, aside from their classical leanings and clear kinship with the prog-rock likes of Queen and Rush (there are some outbreaks of metal here), Muse often draw on classic pop, employing lush 1960s-style arrangements. With "Blackout" they go even further, daring to conjure Bacharach's "Magic Moments". If there's a weakness here, it's that the songwriting remains inconsistent, but this is usually covered up by musicianship and studio wizardry that leave Coldplay languishing in Muse's dust. -Dominic Wills.

The title Songs to Sing in A&E isn't simply a reference to Jason Pierce's chords of choice on this, the sixth album from Spiritualized. Rather, it's a blackly comic reference to the events that preceded this album's creation-specifically, a bout of pneumonia that saw Pierce fighting for his life from a hospital bed. Spiritualized, however, have always specialised in transforming personal travails into great art, and there's something morbidly compelling about a song like "Death Takes Your Fiddle", a chilly blues song accompanied by the wheeze of an artificial respirator. There may be some unfortunate repercussions from Pierce's illness: his voice sounds somewhat frail in comparison to the brave soul we found on 1997's Ladies and Gentlemen, We Are Floating in Space, and this rather seems to expose occasional shortcomings in his lyrics (to follow a song called "I Gotta Fire" with "Soul on Fire" and then "Sitting on Fire" suggests wells of inspiration may be running low). One thing's for sure, though, Pierce is a fine arranger. Lush strings, choirs and flourishes of percussion flesh out simple acoustic songs into impressive symphonies. Meanwhile, "Yeah Yeah" proves Pierce still has a way with an itchy, strung-out blues stomp. -Louis Pattison.

Proving yet again their willingness to dice 'n' slice their burgeoning legacy into new-if not exactly fresh-product, the Fab Four Minus One released this single disc compendium of their No. 1 hits. Though obviously superfluous to long-time Fabs faithful (who may also find themselves quibbling over the precise definition of "No. 1 hit" and the exclusion of seeming contenders like "Please Please Me" and "Strawberry Fields"), newly arrived visitors from the Pleiades star cluster and other neophytes will find it a concise and generous (nearly 80 minutes) single-disc introduction to the band's career-spanning, unparalleled dominance of pop music in the 1960s and beyond. But more than merely a trophy case of commercial success (and it won't be hard to find people to argue that these singles aren't even the band's best work), 1 is also a quick sketch of a remarkable seven-year musical evolution, one that stretches from the neo-skiffle of "Love Me Do" through a remarkable synthesis of R&B, rockabilly, Tin Pan Alley, gospel, country and classical that still defies efforts to effectively deconstruct it. -Jerry McCulley.

History gives Steely Dan's Walter Becker and Donald Fagen the last, hearty laugh on this, the crown jewel in their remarkable canon of 1970s Mensa-pop. Sneaking onto the charts a half-decade earlier with sinuous, jazz-inflected "rock", the dysfunctional duo's acerbic, anti-heroic visions had been critically lauded for their band identity and killer guitar riffs, then promptly challenged when the two songwriters retired from the road, dissolved any formal band lineup, and used the studio as laboratory. Aja carried the added indignity of its increased focus on sophisticated jazz models and musicianship, which carried the Dan's ambitions even further in terms of suave harmonies, intricate song structures, and brilliant playing. Time has proven them wiser than their rock crit detractors: These seven songs abound in knotty plots, sneaky imagery, and drop-dead brilliant performances from a blue chip studio repertory studded with first-call jazz players epitomised by Wayne Shorter's towering solo on the title song. From the hard-boiled jazz romance of "Deacon Blues" to the twisted Homeric vamp of "Home at Last", the veiled but ominous swing of "Peg" to the sci-fi eroticism of "Josie", Aja is a modern pop classic and the coolest fusion record no one ever thought to lump in that category. -Sam Sutherland.

Heralded in the UK by an ultra-cool remix by JXL, Elvis: 30 #1 Hits is one of the most succinct packages of Presley's best work ever released. Based on the idea of the Beatles 1 album, this compilation includes all 31 Elvis singles that have been number one in either the US or the UK. Set in roughly chronological order, the collection begins with his first hit, the swaggering "Heartbreak Hotel". Despite digital remastering it still sounds nearly half a century old when compared to his most recent (and posthumous) hit "A Little Less Conversation", but it remains a timeless classic for new generations to discover. Most people-young or old-will know of or be able to hum a few bars from most of the songs here. Many a karaoke singer will have had a stab at "Love Me Tender" or "Suspicious Minds"; others will have heard a family member brutally crooning their way through "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" or "It's Now or Never". Twenty-five years after Elvis's untimely death, younger generations have become accustomed to the image of Presley as a tragic icon of comedy excess, remembering him for garish jump-suits, trademark shades and a thick black quiff. Elvis: 30 #1 Hits will remind many that he was the King for a very good reason. -David Trueman.

Having recently and radically reinvented themselves-and their business model-with recent album Ghosts I - IV, Trent Reznor and team are back with another 45 minutes of brand new music. The Slip, released free as a download and licensed again under the Creative Commons license, follows up musically and conceptually on themes already explored on Ghosts I - IV as well as on older projects like Year Zero, With Teeth and The Fragile. Ambient electronic loops mingle with dark lyrics and searing rock riffs to create a progressive and at times prophetic tapestry, which begins with the ambient "999,999", morphs into the scintillating rock of "1,000,000", and the post-disco of "Discipline" and ends with seven-minute meditations like "Corona Radiate". Along the way are some classic NIN moments. "Head Down" harks back to a more traditional sound, while "The Lights in the Sky" won't surprise anyone that knows Reznor's fondness for blending pretty piano melodies with morbid lyricism. There are indulgences here-not least the eleven-minute "The Four of Us Are Dying"-but many will consider it a small price to pay for such beautiful sonic bravery. -Paul Sullivan.

At the start of the 1970s, when the music world was ruled by grim longhairs and wafflesome prog rockers, Roxy Music appeared to have beamed in from another planet. Impossibly alien and exotic, they bucked contemporary trends by being kitsch, avant-garde, experimental and yet unashamedly pop. Bryan Ferry was the louche, sensual front man, Brian Eno threw his deconstructionist spanner in the works and they played songs that sounded like demented, sexy logarithms. After Eno left in 1973, frustrated that Ferry was marginalising his input, Roxy became a different beast entirely, developing a suave, sophisticated pop-soul that abandoned the art-rock niche to embrace a wider audience. This lush Best Of compilation, released to accompany their reunion tour (minus Eno), captures both sides of Roxy and, true to the subversive spirit that informed their early years, does so in reverse order. This anti-chronology means they open with the languid, supper-club croon of 1980s hits "Avalon" and "More Than This", plus the beauteous cover of John Lennon's "Jealous Guy", then peel back the years through mid-period gems like "Dance Away" and "Love Is The Drug" before closing with the hyperventilating, superbly twisted bubblegum of "Pyjamarama" and "Virginia Plain". A bonkers track-listing then but an essential souvenir of a band-and a talent-in a million. -Ian Gittins.