For those of you who didn’t think it was possible for Adele to up her stakes in the game of soul-baring, think again. Her first album in six years is here and it is as raw as it is rowdy, as searing as it is silk, as relatable as it is enjoyably escapist.

30 begins with warm-up song “Strangers By Nature”, a retro kitsch drift with dreamy strings and the melancholic caress of Karen Carpenter, ending with a spoken word line in that distinct Tottenham accent, “Alright then I'm ready”. Deep breath.

A poet I know once went to a boarding school to deliver an open class on poetry. Part of the day consisted of the children producing poems of their own, which their guest teacher then looked over and discussed with them. Almost every one was about flight, or escape into vast, open swathes of nature. These weren’t poems, he realised, these were the yearning, silent screams of perpetual prisoners.

There is unquestionably a more mellow side to the Jesus and Mary Chain these days, even when reviving their most ferocious glories from the past. Prior to launching this two-halved set, comprising their 1987 classic Darklands to begin with and a mixture of singles, B-sides and obscurities for after, vocalist Jim Reid took time out to politely explain the format.

Immortality is reserved for monotheistic religions and Marvel superheroes, but in the material world, we also know Abba’s songs are ageless and will not die. After all, they have their Abbatars; we have our abattoirs.

It may go against rock n’ roll cliché, but occasionally there is merit to good time keeping for a band. Lucia and the Best Boys saw their support slot in their home town of Glasgow reach an ignominious ending when they were cut off a song early, vocalist Lucia Fairfull’s chat having seen the glam synth pop group go over their allocated slot.

Chris Martin has talked, not for the first time, of this finally being the Coldplay era of “no rules or fear”. Swedish pop producer Max Martin (The Weeknd, Taylor Swift) gives Music of the Spheres a contemporary, EDM-pumped veneer, with further demographic-heat-seeking pacts with Selena Gomez and K-pop stars BTS.

This record is a heck of a metatextual experience to listen to. In releasing his debut album, 24 year old Finneas O’Connell is attempting to step out of the shadow of one of the biggest pop cultural behemoths of our time – his own sister, Billie Eilish, who he also writes and produces for – and mark out a creative lane of his own. And he’s documenting this in many of these songs, which touch repeatedly on his experience of fame, struggles with identity and the like.

Time waits for no band, as Maximo Park’s lively singer Paul Smith opined early into his band’s set. “I am young and I am lost” he declared during "The Coast Is Always Changing"’s jangly guitar-pop, before drily admitting afterwards that he might have to retire those words soon enough.

Lil Nas X is good at being a pop star. Like, what could pop culture need more than a young, flamboyant, witty gay rapper from the deep south who can top the US country charts then just when it appeared he might not be able to live up to the success of “Old Town Road” lap dance Satan in the video for the Latin-tinged “Call me by Your Name” and storm to mega sales all over again?

Dylan’s 1980s weren’t great in terms of critical acclaim. As an emerging new fan, I knew that first hand from the scathing reviews accorded Shot of Love by the British music press when it was released in the summer of 1981, it seemed about as welcome as a door-knocking Jehovah’s Witness first thing on a Sunday morning.