Album: John Maus, A Collection of Rarities and Previously Unreleased Material (Ribbon Music)

Minnesotan avant-synth musician John Maus, a philosophy professor by day, is best known for the 2011 track "Streetlight", although you'd be forgiven for assuming his work was some 30 years older.

With its anguished lyrics, echo-laden vocals and swooshing synthesizers, it's very, very 1980s indeed, reminiscent of Simple Minds before it all went wrong. The odds-and-ends nature of this compilation is spelt out by its title, but the quality barely suffers for that.