Jamie Smith spent five years distilling The xx's spectral melancholy into something you could actually dance to, sampling Gil Scott-Heron and recruiting Popcaan and Young Thug for an album that moves from London bass weight to Caribbean heat without breaking a sweat.

The steel drums on Loud Places hit like recovered memory, while Gosh builds tension like a proper warehouse anthem should. A Mercury Prize nominee that won a Grammy, In Colour proved the sullen kid from south London had been studying house music's emotional architecture all along.