Gordon Gano & The Ryans: Under the Sun

The best moments on this CD are those recalling not the Violent Femmes, but their angsty contemporaries, Talking Heads

Corb Lund: Losin’ Lately Gambler

There's so much local detail in Lund's latest album that by the closing song you feel you could pass for an Albertan

Bo Ningen: Korashitai Kimochi

This debut four-track vinyl release from the Japanese quartet splatters psychedelic guitar over choppy post-punk riffs

Al Jarreau: The Very Best Of: An Excellent Adventure

Many see Jarreau as the prince of jazz singers, yet the evidence is hard to come by on this glossy, pop-tinged collection

The Isles: Troika

This second album from the New York four-piece is so indebted to the Smiths that you wonder why they bothered making it

Tchaikovsky/Prokofiev: Rococo Variations and Symphony-Concerto

Gautier Capuçon’s French sensibility is ideally suited to Tchaikovsky's nostalgia and he digs deep into Prokofiev’s angst

Badly Drawn Boy: Is There Nothing We Could Do?

In his latest album, Damon Gough is once again as wayward as he is brilliant, but he has neverthless produced some gems

Brahms/Liszt

Grace Francis’s remarkable debut disc reveals a prodigious technique coupled with a deep, glowing musical sensitivity

Ray Davies: The Kinks Choral Collection

Classics such as Waterloo Sunset and Shangri-la are rather pointlessly backed up by the Crouch End Festival Chorus

Miles Davis: The Complete Columbia Album Collection

This 70-CD box set, spanning 35 years, must represent one of the most imposing bodies of work in the whole of modern music

Gershwin: Porgy and Bess

The choir don’t completely convince as the denizens of Catfish Row, but Harnoncourt’s work with the COE is outstanding

Billie Holiday The Complete Commodore and Decca Masters

You’ll know the songs — from Strange Fruit to God Bless the Child — but they’ve never been brought together as here

Various Artists: Beginner’s Guide to African Funk

Nobody wants to be labelled a beginner, but neophytes could do far worse than stump up a fiver for these 42 crackers

Kats Karavan: The History of John Peel on the Radio

That Peel was first to hear several bands who did go on to achieve greatness is a point underscored by this collection

Dennis Russell Davies: Haydn Complete Symphonies

Haydn’s anniversary year ends with a lovely bumper bundle: 37 CDs of his endlessly inventive symphonies

Plácido Domingo: Puccini Ritrovato

What do you give a Puccini collector for Christmas? Possibly this collection of opera morsels

Carla Bley: Carla’s Christmas Carols

Bley takes a dozen seasonal staples and subtly refashions them in her warm, quirky style

Rupa & the April Fishes: Este Mundo

If you have matured beyond Manu Chao, there is plenty to enjoy on this second album from the San Franciscans

Snoop Dogg: Malice N Wonderland

The "supergangster" has produced a record drenched in disaster-movie samples and ever more complicated personal branding