Album

More misery from Scots satirists

Rough and ready rarities package

Classy chill-out anthology follows hit formula

Lost folk treasure unearthed

After the early patronage of Howe Gelb, Oregon's Matt Ward dished up 2001's End Of Amnesia, one of the most breathtaking albums of recent years. Transfiguration...is another masterclass in deft guitar picking, smudged with piano, harmonica and a voice like honey drizzled onto a dry creekbed. The behind-a-screen-door quality of production adds to the strangeness, while the likes of "Undertaker" often stop, start, scuff around then veer off at a tangent. Somewhere between a Gelb bothering to finish off songs and The Band at their most bucolic.

Frequently awesome country-spacerock from Washington DC

Jazz-tinged folk from prolific, political US singer-songwriter

Left-field concept album from arthouse diva

First since 2001's Returning Jesus from durable duo

Plastic pop tarts' revival confirmed by box set