The second full album by Cranes, Forever provided the band something close to an alternative radio hit in the US thanks to a single remix of “Jewel” by Robert Smith. But both song and album straight up showcase the stark, dramatic impact of the band, Alison Shaw’s famously winsome, near whispered singing matching up against everything from sinuous, powerful arrangements to skeletal, end-of-the-night/end-of-the-world atmospheres. Some called them shoegazers but songs like “Everywhere” and “Adrift” are in their own plane.

– Ned Raggett