Wire’s latest record is another excellent example of what they’ve always done — being impressively odd, writes Jacob Bernard-Banton

Harry Styles’ baffling and bombastic solo debut leads our round-up of the week’s new releases

Her sister may have beaten her to the finish line, but Solange Knowles’ effort is more cohesive and understated

Run-of-the-mill guitar bands are the order of the day at this year’s Dot to Dot, but minor indie gems and slap-bass soul provide some much-needed respite

Never one to be ostentatious, Jessy Lanza’s subtle second album flirts with R&B and Chicago house on a brilliant pop album that leans towards the dancefloor

We’ve come to expect strong punk-pop songwriting from the Thermals, but their seventh record’s cumbersome 90s emo revival is lacklustre and very forgettable

No closer to the kind of success their peers have enjoyed, Yeasayer’s latest sees confusion stand in for cohesion

Electronic music can seem like a bit of a boy’s club, but there have always been women involved. The tide is surely turning

Started in the small, unassuming town of Redcar, North Yorkshire, Stephen Bishop’s cassette label Opal Tapes is a kind of mecca for off-kilter electronic music

Virgo Four’s version of Chicago house was always a little more offbeat and introverted than their peers, but it was just as futuristic and innovative

Kanye West’s much-anticipated and flawed seventh album The Life of Pablo will delight and piss off in equal measure. But it wouldn’t be a Kanye West album if it didn’t piss off somebody

Hinds’ charming, rip-roaring garage-rock revivalism had the audience in Gorilla right in the palms of their hands

It took four years for the return of Michael Lovett’s sci-fi synthpop project NZCA Lines. He discusses JG Ballard, singing with a cold and music in 2086 with Jacob Bernard-Banton

Ten years ago, J Dilla left behind his nostalgic, life-affirming swansong, the 31-track masterpiece Donuts: a sprawling and inspired distillation of 70s black music that cemented his status as a musical genius

David Bowie doesn’t like looking back down memory lane in heritage rock docs. Instead, he delivers strange, serpentine albums like Blackstar with both eyes set firmly on the future

What’s the solution to the new and “improved” NME? Dump it—that’s what

As cold winter nights roll in, Burial’s dubstep masterpiece hardly seems more appropriate for rediscovering, thinks Jacob Bernard-Banton

Pressure on Viet Cong to change their name has been successful. Less successful has been attempts to debate censorship in art, says Jacob Bernard-Banton

The crossover project of Matt Berninger and Brent Knopf is an inventive and immediate hook-filled album

A live show beamed in from another world, Metric pulled out enough sartorial and musical class to leave us wondering if we still inhabited Earth