Air 'Moon Safari' (Virgin) Chilled Frenchmen make beautiful easy listening with 70s synths, vocoders and their curious 'moon boot' fetish. The chill-out sound of the nine-eight.

Fatboy Slim 'You've Come A Long Way Baby' (Skint) It's Normo's year. After the hugeness of 'Brimful Of Asha'and 'Rockafeller Skank', Fatboy turns his 303s up to 11 with a second album that rocks from start to finish.

Deep Dish 'Junk Science' (Deconstruction) The Washington duo prove that you can make a great house album - with a little help from Tracey Thorne, some drum n' bass beats and the odd Wild West guitar.

Danny Tenaglia 'Tourism' (Twisted) Tenaglia may be the DJ's DJ, but this house album's more than just a bunch of bangin' club tracks (although 'Music Is The Answer' and 'Elements' sound spot-on).

Beastie Boys 'Hello Nasty' (Capitol) The oldest teenagers in the world return. Fancy some electro-tinged beats and whiney rapping? You got it...

Massive Attack 'Mezzanine' (Virgin) Britain's coolest band smoke a load of skunk and end up more miserable than Marvin The Paranoid Android. Bring on The Cure samples!

Lo-Fidelity Allstars 'How To Operate With A Blown Mind' (Skint) 1998 was make-or-break for big beat. Monkey Mafia sink, but the Lo-Fi's come up smiling with their mix of indie rock and brassic beats.

Rae & Christian 'Northern Sulphuric Soul' (Grand Central) Fat City's hip hop and soul soundclashes bear fruit with this stunning artist album.

UNKLE 'Psyence Fiction' (MoWax) Beats by DJ Shadow. Star turns by Richard Ashcroft and Thom Yorke. Hype by James Lavelle. "It was like making Apocolypse Now!" reckoned the MoWax boss.

Faithless 'Sunday 8pm' (Cheeky) Rollo and friends keep the same formula: splice folky trip hop to boshing epic house. Then sell bucketloads.