5. Manic Street Preachers -
"Talk about hitting the ground running... If you'd read nothing of the background to the Manic Street Preachers' ninth album and instead expected a linear progression from 2007's comparatively camp and bombastic Send Away The Tigers; then this opening burst of acerbic, pumping rock-muscle will totally blind-side you. Recorded in Wales' Rockfield Studios during the latter part of 2008, Journal for Plague Lovers merges the last available musings of Richey Edwards and a mature band with the perspective and desire to process them." Mark Eglinton

Read the full Quietus review here