Reviews

Since surfacing from the Detroit underground in 1993, Matthew Smith's outfit have trodden an ever tangential path with infuriating results. Touching all bases from garage rock through prog, psychedelia and beyond requires a deft touch that's often eluded them but, though this record still finds the ground shaking beneath their feet, it's probably their most assured to date.

Pioneering German techno-dubsters relax rigorous approach to electronica

Titanic ambient metal, featuring a declamatory Julian Cope

Skunk Anansie vocalist goes it alone

Two CD'n'DVD best-of for the band Noel Gallagher once roadied for

Wide-ranging anthology selected by Brubeck himself

Classic frat-rock spanning 1964-66

Documentary about the lives of gay and lesbian orthodox and Hasidic Jews

Veteran producer Irwin Winkler's 1990 directorial debut, recreating the paranoid climate that enveloped early-'50s Hollywood during the anti-communist witch-hunts. Robert De Niro is the fictitious RKO director watching lives, morals and ethics come apart under the strain. A clear-eyed and heartfelt history lesson, with a Martin Scorsese cameo that's a barely disguised portrait of blacklist exile Joseph Losey.

Claude Lelouch arguably never surpassed this 1966 Oscar-winning romance, which sweetened French new wave experimentation for the global mainstream. For all the heart-tugging lyricism, it's still immensely affecting. Bright Anouk Aimée and brave Jean-Louis Trintignant, both widowed, fall in love as that durable theme tune twinkles away.