From the opening hum of crickets and distant to the tribal drums, Django Django’s debut album opens with an eclectic and varying sense of experimentation.

Judging by ‘Tramps’, her second LP, Sharon Van Etten has an almost incurably mournful soul.

Fans of Those Darlins’ debut album, brace yourselves… and not in a good way.

In a world where Best Coast already exist, Tennis’ 2011 debut album, ‘Cape Dory’, was a pretty redundant affair.

It’s now so easy for bedroom musicians to produce electronic music that the sheer volume of the stuff makes it difficult for individuals to stand out from the masses.

In ‘Idealistic Animal’, Dear Reader – aka 28 year old Cheri MacNeil – has created a break-up record in an untraditional sense.

There’s almost no doubt that the quintet of roused Australian youngsters that make up Boy & Bear are comprehensively nice.

Your worst fears about ‘Nothing’ are probably right. The late-year, post-album extended-play sounds like the runoff of a few constructions that didn’t make the cut for ‘Dedication’.

Milagres are a Brooklyn-based quintet fronted by a certain Kyle Wilson, whose soaring vocal style sits somewhere between Thom Yorke and Chris Keating of Yeasayer.

On first encounter, ‘Bad Dream Hotline’ is your standard emo-goth release – black on black cover art, tracks called things like ‘A Handsome Stranger Called Death’ and ‘Dance & Weep’.