Songlines has announced its list of the Songlines Best Albums of 2014, and featured among the year's ten best are three albums familiar to readers of the Nonesuch Journal: Robert Plant's lullaby and... The Ceaseless Roar, Kronos Quartet's A Thousand Thoughts, and Toumani and Sidiki Diabaté's Toumani & Sidiki.

Robert Plant’s label debut, lullaby and… The Ceaseless Roar was produced by Plant and features 11 new recordings, nine of which are original songs he wrote with his band, The Sensational Space Shifters. "It’s really a celebratory record," says Plant, "powerful, gritty, African, Trance meets Zep." Look for a review of the album in the next issue of Songlines magazine.

Released in Kronos Quartet's 40th anniversary year, A Thousand Thoughts is a look at the group's geographically wide-ranging sources, featuring music from 14 different countries, including China, India, Sweden, and Vietnam. The album includes the four cellists who have been in Kronos Quartet over the last 36 years. Ten of the album’s 15 pieces are previously unreleased. 

"David Harrington and his colleagues have long been intrepid world music adventurers, expanding the string quartet repertoire with works from diverse sources and genres around the globe," wrote Songlines reviewer Nigel Williamson in his five-star review earlier this year. "What sets Kronos apart from most who have trained in the Western classical tradition is their invention, experimentation with microtonality and ability to re-think the capabilities of their instruments ... Happy birthday to Kronos Quartet, one of the musical marvels of our ages."

Kora master Toumani Diabaté and his eldest son Sidiki released the recording Toumani & Sidiki on World Circuit, distributed in North America by Nonesuch Records. The album is a set of unaccompanied kora duets, featuring both obscure, almost forgotten kora pieces and a new look at some Mandé classics from Mali.

The album is "brimming with burnished melodies and virtuoso playing and the production is pristine," wrote Williamson in the Songlines review. "Yet perhaps the most impressive aspect is the sheer diversity of the sonic palette ... Every note in this rich tapestry of strings is exquisitely calibrated in the pursuit of perfection."

For the full list of Songlines Best Album of 2014, visit songlines.co.uk. Complete coverage will appear in the January/February 2015 issue of the magazine, available on newsstands December 5.