After two straight years packed with more sparkling jewels than a DeBoers warehouse, this year seems a bit flat with regard to brilliant albums. There's been no shortage of *good* stuff, but where is the *great* stuff?

I am at a loss to explain why there have been an unusually large number of Verve releases this year. I first used the term "Verve release" to justify the inclusion of Drugstore's "White Magic for Lovers" in my 1998 top ten. The term is named after Wigan's finest disbanded prog-rockers, (The) Verve, who produced a few inconsistent albums, but when they were on, they were ON.

"Verve release", def.: an album characterized by a wide disparity between the strongest and weakest material, in which the strong material represents the clear majority of the total album and is strong to the point of near-godliness, whereas the (minority) weaker material evokes relative indifference.

I have often used two-thirds as my typical "clear majority". For two-thirds of "Urban Hymns", Verve showed why they were one of the top three or four bands in the world. But with songs such as "One Day" and "Catching the Butterfly", they were mortal.

Verve releases are typically not great albums. "White Magic For Lovers" is a good album, but both of Drugstore's other albums are better. Depeche Mode's "Ultra" is one of their best albums, but it is also a Verve release, as is this year's "Exciter", not to mention 1993's "Songs of Faith and Devotion". Before that, they did much better with the uniformly great "Violator" and "Music for the Masses".

Slowdive's "Just for a Day" is a fine album, but its best material doesn't even touch the best material on the follow-up, "Souvlaki". The latter is the greatest Verve release of all time. Thus, Slowdive are a rare exception -- a band whose best work was not only an outstanding album, but also a Verve release. Remember, an important mark of a Verve release is the disparity: "40 Days", "Alison" and "Here She Comes" just cream "Melon Yellow" and "Sing".

As I was saying, 2001 has been chock full of Verve releases. Perhaps the best of the lot is Arab Strap's "The Red Thread". As a prelude, I should mention that ordinarily, the disparity of the material and the track ordering have no clear correlation. With "The Red Thread", things begin relatively unmemorably, then gain considerable momentum leading through "The Devil-Tips". Then, about two minutes into "The Long Sea", over an aching guitar riff, Aidan Moffat pants the classic line "23 years of foreplay led up to this", and that precise moment signals the passage of this album into fifth gear, and the remainder is nothing short of the bee's knees.

New Order's "Get Ready" contains some awesome songs, but much like "Republic", they are mainly packed near the beginning, with the quality slipping noticably by albums' end.