Landlocked sailors, Loyalist death squads and REM homages…

Uncut heads west to encounter Polly Jean Harvey on her Dorset home turf

First off, a quick announcement that our latest Uncut Ultimate Music Guide will be out next week, dedicated this time to Radiohead. I'll write more about that soon, but in the meantime, while I'm finishing the next issue of Uncut itself, please dig in to the assembled tunes below.

2015 has already got off to a good start, with Foxcatcher and Whiplash coming later this month (although I’m afraid I really didn’t like either Birdman or American Sniper).

A belated happy new year, everyone; I trust the new issue of Uncut, with David Bowie on the cover, is easing you into 2015 in a relatively optimistic way. Not least, of course, because there's a hefty preview of some of the next 12 months' key albums, with plenty of quotes from the artists involved; Paul Weller, New Order, Laura Marling, My Morning Jacket, Matt White, Alabama Shakes, The Pop Group, Giorgio Moroder and so on.

Here, for your consideration, is Uncut's list of the 20 Best Films Of 2014. If you're interested in the administrative aspect of this list, it was voted for by a shadowy cabal of Uncut staffers, writers and a few trusted confidants. It broadly dovetails with my own personal Top 20, though I think the film that's stuck with me most throughout the year is the wonderfully strange Under The Skin. But I won't detain you further. Have a great Christmas and New Year, by the way: see you in 2015.

Sorry I didn't manage to post a playlist last week; a combination of germs, deadlines and various other professional/seasonal distractions meant that I ran out of time.

"Most people turn a corner, Neil ricochets," says the Crazy Horse guitarist

Lake and collaborators on the creation of a very unlikely festive hit…

When Thom Yorke sneaked out his new solo album a few months back, I managed to hold out for 66 hours before writing a review of "Tomorrow's Modern Boxes". Since waking up early yesterday morning to a lot of very excited Americans on my Twitter timeline, I've been playing D'Angelo's "Black Messiah" many times: another rich and complex album that seems fundamentally ill-suited to any kind of snap judgment reviewing.