A Girl Called Eddy · 2004 · She sat on the follow-up for fifteen years. This one record made the wait almost worth it.

Sarah McLachlan · 1993 · She turned piano ballads into stadium-filling anthems without losing the whisper.

The Sundays · 1992 · This album proves that you don't need to shout to fill a room. Harriet Wheeler's voice and David Gavurin's guitar create a silence you can fall into.

Natalie Prass · 2015 · The producer of the album also runs Spacebomb Records, and this is what happens when you let a 23-year-old with punk roots write a soul record for a 40-piece orchestra.

Minnie Riperton · 1970 · Charles Stepney gave her an orchestra and she sang straight through the ceiling.

Leonard Cohen · 1967 · The voice you either fall into or never understand — but the writing is beyond question.

Sandy Denny · 1971 · She had already written 'Who Knows Where the Time Goes' and was the only guest vocalist on Led Zeppelin's 'The Battle of Evermore'. This album is quieter and stranger than all of that.

The Corrs · 2000 · Mutt Lange produced three tracks, the rest were pure Corrs, and the mix of fiddle, tin whistle, and radio-ready chorus never sounded better.

Van Morrison · 1968 · Van Morrison walked into Century Sound Studios with a guitar and a notebook and walked out with something nobody had ever heard before.

Antonio Carlos Jobim · 1970 · Creed Taylor took Jobim to New York and got a stoned masterpiece out of him.

Antonio Carlos Jobim · 1967 · Claus Ogerman’s strings don’t just accompany Jobim’s piano — they complete thoughts he could only hint at.

Ann Peebles · 1969 · Ann Peebles didn’t need to scream – she just opened her mouth and the Memphis Horns did the rest.

Bettye Swann · 1969 · She sang like she'd already lived the song twice.

Leonard Cohen · 1988 · He traded the acoustic guitar for a synth and somehow got darker and funnier.

Jennifer Warnes · 1987 · A backup singer who knew Cohen's notebooks better than most of his producers steps in front of his band and makes you realise the songs were always perfect — you just hadn't heard them right.

Ella Fitzgerald · 1956 · Norman Granz gave her a full orchestra and the best session men in Los Angeles. She gave them back definitive readings of every Rodgers and Hart song worth knowing.

Ella Fitzgerald · 1959 · Few singers could handle both the comedy and the heartbreak of a single Gershwin clause like Ella could, and Riddle gave her a ballroom to prove it.

Jazmine Sullivan · 2021 Spin it Again - It takes a lot to make an album about being a 'heaux' feel like a sacred text.

Julia Holter · 2018 Spin it Again - Holter finally let the songs breathe — recorded at home with a small rig, prodded into life by motherhood and a trust in the unfinished.

C. Tangana · 2021 Spin it Again - He took the copla and the flamenco his grandmother loved and bent them into 2021 without ever breaking them.