Album: Various artists, In The Name of Love: Africa Celebrates U2 (Wrasse)

Not as bad as you'd expect. For one thing, much as I admire U2's songcraft, anything's preferable to Bono's mannered croon.

For another, almost every African artist here has completely ignored the U2 template and strongly asserted their own musical identity, so that occasionally you'll be hard pushed to even name that tune. Keziah Jones turns the sombre "One" into a jagged samba, and the Soweto Gospel Choir, with voices alone, make "In the Name of Love" even more epic – but then those great voices could probably turn "My Ding-a-Ling" into a sublime phallocentric hymn.

Pick of the Album: Vieux Farka Touré makes 'Bullet the Blue Sky' his own