The mismatched threesome of Cancer Bats, In Case Of Fire and Attack! Attack! struggle with the acoustics while supporting Funeral For A Friend in Portsmouth.

No Mundane Options could be the most misnamed album of the year; The Paddingtons redefine mediocrity in the punk vernacular.

Cardiff’s Attack! Attack! achieve the nigh-impossible with their eponymous début album – ten tracks of pop rock that doesn’t make you want to barf up your lunch.

The Elephant In The Room with Blackmarket’s début album is its disappointing blandness and uniformity of character.

Broken Records belie their band name with two tracks of blissfully melancholic indie-folk on new single “Lies”.

Alt-rock Mancunians Smith 6079 seem to be searching unsuccessfully for a direction on Halloween-released single “Ghosts”.

Nottingham three-piece Lords have pretty much nailed the whole retro blues-rock thing with second album Everyone Is People.

It’s country-rock by the numbers on The Thief & The Heartbreaker EP from new Noel Gallagher favourites Alberta Cross.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to MySpace, I Am Ghost appear and lower the bar for weak shitty goth-tinged pop-metal with Those We Leave Behind.

White Denim seem to have completely reinvented the idea of the music single; “Shake Shake Shake” is quite possibly the best way to waste three minutes created this year.