From a medieval monk’s tribute to Henze’s cat-opera and Ravel’s erotic yowling, music celebrates the feline like no other animal. Here are 10 of the best, with not even a whisker of a certain musical...

Ben Wheatley’s new version of the gothic thriller Rebecca joins an impressive list of big-screen Du Maurier adaptations

From Buzzcocks’ essential punk anthems and lovelorn tales to his solo electronica, the late musician was one of the finest songwriters of a generation

France’s leading musical ambassador, who died on Monday, was admired by such disparate entertainers as Bob Dylan, Elvis Costello and sometime Sex Pistol Glen Matlock

In the last of this series, we look back at Soft Cell’s bleak but beautiful synthpop – from their run of Top 3 hits to their disintegration amid drug use and nervous breakdown

From synapse-popping celebrations of lust to joyous rebuttals of industry sexism, we run down the best tracks by R&B’s queen of hedonistic mischief

In his short life, the country star wrote some of the most lasting and influential songs in popular music and laid the foundations for rock’n’roll. Here’s our selection of his finest moments

Roll out the lino and shake out the talc as we spin and slide through ten Torch tunes and Casino classics from Britain’s rare soul underground

As the US prepares for a total solar eclipse, here are some of the best songs to enjoy as the sky goes dark

Throat-shredding Vietnam polemics and proto-punk riffs abound in our pick of the Detroit hellraisers’ finest tracks

Pioneers in almost everything except commercial success, the Velvets put drugs, fetishism, infidelity and heartbreak into song and changed music completely

With Karen’s silky-smooth, heartfelt vocals and Richard’s genius as a songwriter and arranger, the brother-and-sister duo pioneered melodic, melancholic pop

The California group’s hybrid soul and funk took a while to form but it was finessed to perfection on hits including Chainey Do, I’m So Excited and Slow Hand

The label founded by Cocteau Twins’ Simon Raymonde and Robin Guthrie turns 20 this month. Here are some of their finest recordings

The greatest song ever written – even singer Ian McCulloch says it himself – and nine more from Liverpool’s indie titans

Flitting from breathless dancehall to hook-laden EDM pop, Rihanna has honed a shapeshifting persona to become the definitive 21st-century megastar

With socially conscious lyrics, infectious boom-bap rhythms and jazz loops, A Tribe Called Quest’s 90s ‘backpack rap’ has stayed fresh until the Trump era

Led Zep and the Stones liked to up the tempo, Blondie blazed a trail that led to Duran Duran and the Gossip … but was it all dreamed up by George Harrison?

In the early 90s, a trio from south-east England set out to fulfil pop’s potential. Nearly 30 years later, they’re still making bold, inventive music