Sarah Cherlin – Small Machines

This ridiculously good debut channels the very best bits of Montaigne and Regina Spektor – as well as both Kates Bush and Miller Heidke – to create a shimmering wonder, a towering wall of pyrotechnic whimsy carrying enough power with it to wipe whole civilisations clean off the map. The musicality here is weapons-grade, swooshing from movement to movement with a delicious grace that is as powerful as it is delicate. It wraps you up and soars away with you into an entirely different world – enough to make you wonder why you’d ever want to come back to the real one outside. Sensational.