A collection of EPs recorded at home, most Decembers since 2001, and given to friends as Christmas cards. Traditional carols and many originals, with stickers, stories, a songbook, and a bunch of stocking fillers.

Respite from his recent firestorms, this conjures from spellbinding acoustics and drones galore something meditative and darkly unsettling by turns. Fine vocals and shredding axe work from Elisa Ambrogio.

Soulful American folk: a gorgeous, heart-stopping mixture of the longing you get in saudade — singers like Cesaria Evora and Joao Gilberto — and political protest. Will Oldham’s in there; so is Dionne Warwick.

Mostly this is slow, stricken Lucinda, as moving and compelling as she gets, grieving for her mum and furious with an ex. Worth putting up with the Patti Smith impressions.

Lovely. Classical songs by such exemplars as Schubert and Schumann, re-imagined with heart and soul as bare, doleful folk. Just voice and electric guitar.

‘Lovely… another gem from Nashville’s underground’, Word; ‘one of the finest pop records ever made by a Nashville band’, Nashville Scene.

Politically indignant, sorely poignant, musically prodigal — Tex Mex through cartoon-Chinese reggae through Brecht ‘n Weil — elegy for local LA neighbourhoods like Chavez Ravine, swept away by 1950s capital.

Superb first album from Andy Cabic, Devendra Banhart, Otto Hauser et al.