BEN FOLDS WITH REGINA SPEKTOR You Don't Know Me 8/10 After a disappointing last album, Folds smooths back into top form. Gently insistent strings and Spektor's elegant croon accompany Folds in lyrically melancholic mood, yet the song is almost school-disco swoonsome.

FRIGHTENED RABBIT I Feel Better 8/10
Superb headlong dramatics as Scott Hutchison's broad Scottish brogue steers a frantic scurrying of Wedding Present riffs and death or glory pace.

WHITE LIES Death 9/10
First proper single from the trio whose hype is justified with every elegaic second. The title is justified - for a band so young, they're in tune with something ancient and poetic. As stately as any song all year.

THE BRIGANTIES Sidestep 6/10
Intriguing debut from Berwick, they have a cool folk tradition at the core, but need to bring it to the surface instead of the harsh indie anthemics.

YO MAJESTY Club Action 8/10
A lesbian hip hop duo sounds the stuff of niche cool kids' appeal. Forget it. The rapidfire delivery is met by minimal, horns-aplenty futuristic beats more inventive and exciting than anything Timbaland's done lately.

MICAH P HINSON We Won't Have To Be Lonesome 6/10 The voice is rich as ever and the baroque swing is great, but the Hammond organ lets it down with a parody of The Band's lonesome epics.

GOO GOO DOLLS Real 3/10
More desperately dull anthemics by numbers from a band incapable of making anything other than vacuous self-help songs. Like One Republic's spiritual parents, devoid of any real emotion.

THE AIRBORNE TOXIC EVENT Does This Mean You're Moving On? 8/10 Almost too cool to be true, the LA band are saved from posing cool by the infectious riffs and handclaps and the frankly sexy snarl in Mikel Jollett's sardonic delivery.

THE DAWN CHORUS She's Like An Angel 9/10 From the year's most under-rated album, we can't recommend highly enough trying these passionate country-rockers - this is a warm, communal campfire melody seriously worthy of Neil Young.

ME MY HEAD Damage Is Done 7/10
From the ashes of contenders The Moths, the Londoners fit Ikara Colt scratchy garage, Future Of The Left hyperactive rants and even a Low Life-era New Order bass into a frenetic debut.

NAT JOHNSON Dirty Rotten Soul 8/10
Ex-Monkey Swallows The Universe singer Johnson launches her solo career with a rattling, traditional Nashville juke-joint hoedown. Once heard, the whipsmart chorus won't be forgotten.

JANE LEDSOM Here Come The Hatters 9/10
Rounding off an unusually fine week of singles is the best football song ever made. OK, as a Luton fan I'm biased, but it really is a Kaisers-via-Jam foot stomping terrace anthem worthy of LTFC.