Our critics round-up this week's biggest music releases...

KATY B
On a Mission
(Rinse/Columbia)
****
Ever since Katy B, an R&B-loving; 21-year-old from Peckham, announced her intentions with last summer's hit single Katy on a Mission, much has been expected of her debut album. It emphatically delivers. An all-London affair, it's released on the Rinse FM label and tells of life as a teenager in the capital through 13 filler-free tracks.

A stellar cast of producers, including Magnetic Man's Benga, provide the dubstep-inspired beats. However, it's B (real name: Kathleen Brien) who's the star, filling the songs with streetwise lyrics delivered in a subtle, soulful voice.

The opener, Power on Me, is one of the few moments in which Brien sounds vulnerable. "Does it make you feel good knowing that you could have power over me?" she asks over an eerie synth figure.

She's more likely to be found bidding boys farewell (Go Away) or bemoaning bad chat-up lines (Easy Please Me). For a graduate of the Brit school, Brien is refreshingly unsentimental in song.

As such, you're prepared to forgive her the odd clunky couplet ("Standing at the bar/With my friend Olivia") and decision to deliver a thank-you speech at the album's end ("Big up to my mum and dad").

Because when this is good, as on the haunting dance-soul hybrid Why You Always Here and synth-propelled pop of Witches Brew, it's thrilling, original and utterly of the moment. Dance music has discovered a new star: mission accomplished, Katy B.
RICK PEARSON

GLASVEGAS
Euphoric Heartbreak
(Columbia)
****
Since Glasvegas's fabulous self-titled debut of 2008, they've lost their drummer, Caroline McKay, and they've lost time and ground in the wake of leader James Allan's fondness for cocaine. For this second album, the Glaswegians decamped to California, but their trademark sound of grandstanding Scottish, fist-clenching intensity allied with an echo-laden homage to Phil Spector's wall of sound remains reassuringly intact, albeit without the hairs-on-the-back-of-the-neck rush of hearing it for the first time. New drummer Jonna Lofgren acquits herself brilliantly on I Feel Wrong (Homosexuality Pt 1), Allan is still on a diet of guilt, misery, pain and regret; ferocious melodies still cascade into one another and, more importantly, there's still the sense that Glasvegas have greatness in them.
JOHN AIZLEWOOD

THE KILLS
Blood Pressures
(Domino)
***
The man/woman duo of Jamie Hince and Alison Mosshart returns with a fourth album that puts further distance between the group and its unwanted and unfavourable White Stripes comparisons. The Kills, once so angry and angular, have caught the melody bug and gone in search of big, harmonious choruses. It is true that Hince retains a fondness for slashing, staccato guitar, while Mosshart is still in possession of more than two lungs, but Blood Pressures has its sensitive side. Wild Charms is dreamy and brief, Baby Says is nothing less than a pop song, and Last Goodbye is decorated with a melancholy piano line. But they sound happiest with drum machine in walloping mode, powering such edgy rockers as Future Starts Slow, Damned If She Do and You Don't Own The Road. Since you're wondering, there's no sign of Kate Moss.
PETE CLARK

ALELA DIANE
Alela Diane & Wild Divine
(Rough Trade)
****
Alela Diane Bevitori emerged from the same small northern Californian town, Nevada City, as Joanna Newsom but is a rather more graspable proposition, the earthy country folk of her third album delivered simply but no less beautiful for that. With her small band (including, in what must be a first, both her husband and her father) she creates a bare, homespun backdrop for a high, emotive singing voice that stays just far enough away from a yodel to be effective. To ensure that her mother isn't left out of this family gathering, two songs are about her, including the lilting Suzanne. There's gentle twanging on the laid-back Long way Down, and a simple banjo pluck setting the pace on the more upbeat Of Many Colours. The moodier thud of White Horse also stands out on an understated treasure.
DAVID SMYTH

JAZZ
KIT DOWNES TRIO
Quiet Tiger
(Basho)
****
Some of his compositions work better than others but everything this adventurous young pianist-composer does is worth a listen. He's a dashing soloist in the best Keith Jarrett manner but keeps such moments brief here, concentrating instead on the possibilities of small-group timbre. Low cello and bass-clarinet notes shadow his trio through a dozen moody originals that vary from the fractured neo-bop of Frizzi Pazzi to the light-footed 5/4 dance-time of In Brixen and the languid grace of With a View, a ballad of Mingus-like resonance. Even the title track, carried mainly by Calum Gourlay's double-bass, is a laid-back affair, drifting gently in and out of tempo. Tenorist James Allsopp guests briefly in this absorbing suite by an unpredictably evolving artist.
JACK MASSARIK

WORLD
THE KARINDULA SESSIONS
Tradi-Modern Sounds from Southeast Congo
(Crammed Discs)
****
It's rough and ready with raucous vocals yelled out over strummed home-made instruments but that didn't stop Konono No 1 becoming a cult success. Karindula music comes from the south-east of Congo in the copper belt and gets its name from a giant banjo made from an oil drum, goatskin and four strings which the player has to sit on to play. Luckily the CD comes with a DVD so you can see this extraordinary music, recorded at a three-day festival, in action. A boy dances on his haunches while spinning a bicycle wheel on his head, another on his back spins a wheel on his foot. The community spirit and the atmosphere are tangible so you feel like you've been there. Extraordinary.
SIMON BROUGHTON