Rock/Popular

Cathy Vard: "Follow Your Heart" (Sony Music).

This album opens with Lullaby, which makes great sense, given that Follow Your Heart would be the perfect album to listen to just before you sleep. Or as you sleep. No, not because it's boring, because it's blessed and probably would lull you into even deeper dreams.

It certainly wouldn't wake you, with its dreamscapes remaining consistent throughout. This is thanks largely to the almost impressionist arranging skills of Bill Sommerville-Large, which bind a disparate selection of compositions as if they were an original song-cycle.

Cathy Vard sings consistently beautifully, with soul. Highlights? The Stolen Child, Going Home and a brace of Paul Simon songs, Bookends and Old Friends. A possible No 1 for Christmas.

By Joe Jackson

The Brian Setzer Orchestra: "The Dirty Boogie" (Interscope)

An album full of surprises and almost limitless delights. So who is Brian Setzer? Used to be the guitarist and songwriter with rock 'n' roll "retro" band, The Stray Cats. But with this set of songs the guy does a kind of Joe Jackson Jumpin' Jive slide back through the 1960s and 1950s, tapping into a wonderfully weird mix, including Bobby Darin's As Long As I'm Singin and Leiber and Stoller's You're The Boss, sung by Elvis and Ann Margret in Viva Las Vegas. But Louis Prima's Jump, Jive An' Wail is more representative. Likewise, Setzer's own compositions, Let's Live It Up and This Cat's On A Hot Tin Roof. Jumpin' jive? More like pumping jive, all the way, with no let up for a moment. A great idea, fronting a big band with a rock 'n' roll guitar sound. A great party album.

By Joe Jackson

David Gray: "White Ladder" (Iht)

Too bad David Gray isn't female and Canadian - he'd have probably sold 10 million records and made the cover of Rolling Stone by now. The Welsh male singer-songwriter was dropped by his record company after his 1996 album, Sell, Sell, Sell, failed to do what it said on the cover, and Gray had to raise the finance for his fourth album and release it on his own, Iht label. He can still rely on a huge following in Ireland, however, and his upcoming countrywide tour is already nearly sold out. Fans of Gray's strident Dylan-meets-Waterboys style will hear some pleasant changes in this new album; the acoustic musings are tempered with electronic beats and trip-hop samples, and on songs such as Please Forgive Me, Babylon and Silver Lining, Gray's voice is measured and mature. Some of the songs on the album will be featured on the soundtrack of This Year's Love, a new film starring Kathy Burke.

By Kevin Courtney