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Album

Chicago – Epic

Sometimes you just have to hand it to the mainstream. Chicago is a riot as a big glossy movie (although I can't vouch for the West End production starring some bloke from Eastenders). Kander and Ebb's songs are a sassy splash of satire, much more scathing and cynical than you might've inferred. Queen Latifah edges in among the Tinseltown divas, and numbers like "Razzle Dazzle" and "We Both Reached For The Gun" rasp with wit and pizzazz.

Entrance – The Kingdom Of Heaven Must Be Taken By Storm

Baltimore freak lets it all hang out

Stephen Jones – Almost Cured Of Sadness

Former Baby Bird man delves deeply into his love/hate relationship with television

Hank Williams – Come September

Portrait of a tragic country genius

Show Me The Money

Two CDs of remixes from the eternally bloody-minded Richard D James

Medium 21 – Killings From The Dial

Young English heirs to The Flaming Lips

Use Your Delusion

Twenty-first album from America's startlingly original lord of lo-fi

The Hidden Cameras – The Smell Of Our Own

Self-styled "gay church folk music" from Toronto

Smallville – Eastwest

The fastest-growing TV show in the US, wherein tales of a young Superman are accompanied by a radio-soft blend of American rock, from Remy Zero's theme to Ryan Adams' "Nuclear". Von Ray's "Inside Out" is the spit of Nickelback, and the new single. Best thing here by a mile is The Flaming Lips' "Fight Test", the opening track of what's been described in these pages as the greatest album since Best Of Jesus Christ Volume One. It's lovely, but owes an extraordinary debt to the Cat Stevens song "Father To Son".

Mark Bacino – The Million Dollar Milkshake

Power pop with guts
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Editor's Picks

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