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POP
Morrissey
Years Of Refusal (Polydor)
***
For his ninth album, Morrissey has lost the swagger and light touch of 2006's Ringleader of the Tormenters and replaced it with an emotionally bleak lyrical landscape that suggests he has run out of patience with humanity. He has swapped pangs of loneliness for simply wanting to be alone: "I was," he notes on That's How People Grow Up, "wasting my time looking for love." With the exception of the dainty You Were Good In Your Time and Jeff Becks guitar cameo on Black Cloud, the relentless, densely textured backdrops offer little comfort.
JOHN AIZLEWOOD

Empire Of The Sun
Walking On a Dream (Virgin)
****
Australian eccentric Luke Steele made guitar-based music with The Sleepy Jackson that deserved a much wider audience, but if it's that failure that has prompted this swerve into glossy electronic pop and a gloriously outlandish new image, we should be grateful. Steele's new band with producer Nick Littlemore dusts his melancholy falsetto with a synth shimmer, creating head-nodding grooves rather than dancefloor fillers. The Pet Shop Boys would give their imminent Brit Award for songs such as We Are the People and the outstanding title track, but they're at their best on Half Mast, the catchiest piece of pop soul since Hall & Oates were cool.
DAVID SMYTH

Grand Duchy
Petits Fours (Cooking Vinyl)
****
Grand Duchy is essentially a collaboration between Frank Black, once the roaring force behind The Pixies, and his wife, Violet Clark. The good news is that Frank has not been on form like this since that band. The even better news is that Violet has a sweet voice that is the perfect foil for her husband, and lends the tracks on which she takes lead vocals a pleasing sweetness. Come On Over to My House is an invitation that only the cracked would accept, Lovesick borrows shamelessly from the Stones, while Black Suit is a tour de force. There is not a bum track here.
PETE CLARK

JAZZ
Tim Garland
Libra (Global Mix)
****
Can jazz improvisation be wedded to formal classical orchestration? Duke Ellington, Stan Kenton and Gunther Schuller all thought so, but it takes classically trained European player-composers like multi-reedman Tim Garland and pianist Gwilym Simcock to take this dangerous liaison all the way. They and drummer Asaf Sirkis blend beautifully with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in a double album built around Garland's Frontier Suite. Now on UK tour (including Kings Place on 6 March), the music features US guitarist Paul Bollenback on three tracks and a sumptuous version of Bill Evans's Blue in Green.
JACK MASSARIK

WORLD
Gangbé Brass Band
Assiko (Contre Jour)
****
It may be a legacy of colonialism, but the brass band has travelled the world to emerge in vibrant new forms from India to the Balkans, from Africa to the South Pacific. And few are as vibrant and packed full of surprises as in Benin, where honking horns meet talking drums and West African voodoo tradition. There's nothing to match these eight guys on stage with their trumpets, trombones and a wraparound sousaphone, but this recording is punchy and bold, capturing the raw power of their performance. There are songs about Africa, slavery and Aids, but the best is Rakia, a sort of love song about an errant man returning to his wife. Strident, powerful, percussive stuff.
SIMON BROUGHTON