The XX Basic Space (Young Turks)

Let's not confuse the concepts of "hotly tipped young British band" and "potential future Live Aid headliners". The XX are a thrilling new prospect, but they also make Nick Drake sound in-yer-face. Like Everything But The Girl's Missing heard through someone else's headphones on the night bus, Basic Space is a collision of spindly post-punk, dubby electronica and tender neo-soul, with twin boy/girl vocals so fragile they feel like dead leaves about to disintegrate in your hands.

Tinchy Stryder Feat Amelle Berrabah Never Leave You (Island)

Dizzee Rascal still exudes a faint air of menace, even when - actually, especially when - he's threatening to "boost you up" with a bit of champagne. Whereas when fellow grime graduate Tinchy Stryder pledges fidelity to the subject of Never Leave You, it's genuinely rather touching: another example of the unpretentious charm that is about to hand Tinchy his third Top 5 hit in a row (although admittedly another killer tune courtesy of his evil musical puppetmaster Fraser T Smith might also have something to do with it).

Simian Mobile Disco Audacity Of Huge (Wichita)

While we wait to discover what kind of psychedelic delights MGMT and the Chemical Brothers will cook up together, here's a clue to what it could - possibly even should - sound like. Over SMD's thumping, twitching beats, Yeasayer's Chris Keating plays the deadpan oily hustler, flaunting his property portfolio in a futile attempt to get laid. The "grape Kool-aid filled swimming pool" and the "duplex in Dubai" are impressive enough. But exactly where does one obtain "a bag of Bill Murray"? At the Zissou-permarket, perhaps?

Antony & The Johnsons Crazy In Love (Rough Trade)

It's kerazzy covers time again, so gather 'round the old Joanna as everyone's favourite countercultural panto dame chirrups his way through Beyoncé's brassy pop classic for ironic giggles. Except, lummee, this is pretty harrowing stuff. Antony has taken the song title literally: B's excitable flushes of first love become scary, uncontrollable surges of emotion, with Antony as their prisoner, being driven slowly insane. The result is unexpectedly, spine-shiveringly compelling. Shame he didn't opt to point up the hidden pathos in Jay-Z's rap, though.

Eminem Beautiful (Interscope)

Ah, just what we need to get us through these troubled times: a depressive, ageing rapper reeling off self-help class cliches (everyone's beautiful inside, be true to yourself, if only you could walk a mile in my shoes maybe you'd care about this solipsistic baloney) over a manky old Brian May ballad. A video of Em wandering through Detroit's decrepit industrial zone lends this song a poignancy it doesn't deserve. Once upon a time, his therapy-rap shtick sounded pretty fresh. But maybe your mum was right all along: this isn't really music, it's just a man talking.