While there will, if there is any justice, be plenty written about King Creosote’s Astronaut Meets Appleman, few will probably state what to me is obvious: this is a really, really sexy record. Now, being Scottish, I’m perhaps predisposed to believe that about anything that features what I can only describe as techno bagpipes - but I defy you to listen, really listen, to the sprawling seven-minute album opener “You Just Want” and not feel at least a little shiver.

If you like the feeling of leaving a show, surrounded by the gently glowing faces of happy fellow audience members, then this is one for you. It’s a musical evening full of joyful singing – mixing classics by Mendelssohn and Bartok with a best-of chunk of the back catalogue from the Electric Light Orchestra’s Jeff Lynne – that transports you to a different world.

If the BBC were to plan a Proms season exclusively devoted to youth orchestras and ensembles, many of us would be delighted. Standards are now at professional level right across the board. 20 years ago, the National Youth Orchestra of Scotland (★★★★★) couldn't compare with its Great British counterpart; now, although the age ranges are slightly different and the (or should that be the) National Youth Orchestra (★★★★) has vast wind and brass sections, playing levels appeared equal.

Even without any particular pomp or focus for celebration, the 70th Edinburgh International Film Festival has felt like a particularly strong and broad-ranging one, with a programme so big it was a struggle to take it all in.

The wish to return to a place of past safety after a traumatic event is understandable. It helps if that place is remote and possibly beyond the reach of any authorities which may want to investigate the event, or even hold someone accountable. In the case of Iona, it’s a return from mainland Scotland to the Inner Hebridean island of the same name where she grew up. It’s not instantly clear what caused her to come back but when she does, it’s apparent that memories are long and the welcome is not as warm it might be. She has a son whom no-one has previously met.

To anyone who says that you can’t make a great film about golf, a film which is funny, sexy, and rousing, I have just two words; sadly, for those who attended the opening night of the Edinburgh Film Festival this week, those words are Tin Cup.

"A funny wee film about music and death" goes the strapline. That’s a pretty accurate summary of Paul Fegan’s touching documentary Where You’re Meant To Be, which follows singer Aidan Moffat – formerly of 1990s indie rockers Arab Strap – as he tours his bawdy urban updates of traditional songs around Scotland.

The journey begins amid the glassy modernity of Perth’s gleaming Concert Hall. From there, you’re bussed a few miles out into the Perthshire countryside to a blasted, burnt-out farmhouse. And its neighbouring barn, transformed into a forest of rifles and a maze of trenches for the National Theatre of Scotland’s sorrowful new World War One show The 306: Dawn.

There’s been wave after wave of successful acoustic singer-songwriters this century, whimpering so-and-sos from David Gray onwards, through Damien Rice, Newton Faulkner, James Blunt, Ed Sheeran, and on and on and on. Every year sees a new heap of them dumped on the public like bowls of flea eggs. Meanwhile, and here’s the real point, one of the genre’s giants remains relatively unheard. Malcolm Middleton’s dourly humorous, existential albums are studded with gems of heartache, wry gloom and inspired observation. Unfortunately, after five of them, he closed up shop in 2009. Until now.

Any appreciation of Scotland’s The Associates is coloured by the knowledge that Billy MacKenzie took his own life at age 39 in January 1997. More than his band’s voice, he personified their unique approach to music. Between 1979 and 1982, with collaborator Alan Rankine, he created a string of vital records which defy genre pigeonholing and define their vehicle The Associates as one of Britain’s most wilful pop acts. Rankine split from MacKenzie in 1982 at the point when they had broken into the charts.