Sick of it all

She walks on stage looking pale and enervated, like a ghostly image of heroin chic. Just what have they done to Thea Gilmore? Then two songs in she reveals she's "got the lurgy, big time". It turns out she's been taking nothing stronger than herbal tea to keep the flu at bay.

His Bobness kicks up a storm among the seven hills and proves he's still armed to the teeth

Shane's grinning Death Angel and his (fairly good) Nashville country album

LaBute blasts back to his best form with sculpted firestarter

Postmodern country from balmy-voiced Lambchopper

Chinese-Maori singer-songwriter delivers album of eerie beauty

First full review of 39-track follow-up to Stankonia from fractured hip hop duo

Dark, hugely inventive '93 animation from Tim Burton, possibly much too spooky for kids (or probably not, the sick little psychos). The Pumpkin King of Halloween tries to co-opt Christmas; the voices of Catherine O'Hara, Pee-Wee Herman and other disreputable types ooh and aah. Dazzling, macabre and faintly mad, an Oscar nominee for visual effects.

Stadium punk from ambitious LA quartet

Potent shoegazing electronica from Antibes, France