Album

The Lancashire-based Palmer has a delicious hair-in-the-voice approach that gives her a tough edge over more fey contemporaries. This, her third album after 2001's self-funded romantica obscura and predecessor A Certain Kind Of Distance, is mostly just acoustic and voice, sparsely adorned with the decorative frills of guitarist Mark Townson, fretless bass, violin, mandolin and cello (the slow string fade of "Followed Down Sundown" is outstanding).

Retro new wave/post-punk Middle Eastern style from Israeli quartet

A selection of the other new albums released this month

Swedish siblings jangle nerves with classy Euro-pop

THE VIDEO COLLECTION

It was hardly a long haul, coming together in 1965 and burning out by 1968, but in the words of Papa John: "We had so much fun for two years, there was no more fun to be had."Yet in that time, The Mamas & The Papas became the USA's pop royal family, the American Beatles. Like The Beatles, they were four instantly recognisable, distinct personalities, with the same ready wit, entertainment value and high visibility factor. John Phillips and wife Michelle, Cass Elliot and Denny Doherty looked and sounded like no other band in the land.

"Unreleased and rareness" from the capacious archives of Cope

A 45th anniversary double-disc celebration of Berry's empire, featuring favourites and odd surprises

Pop hack sounds polished but slack

Clammy electro-sleaze from Vancouver wild card