Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly - Searching For The Hows And Whys

Do you think Sam Duckworth has ever regretted picking a name as stupid as Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly for his music career? Even Panic! At The Disco realised that punctuation and music don't mix well, but Duckworth soldiers on with his, even sending journalists a free pencil with the name written down the side to remind us where the full stops go. Mind you, he also seems to struggle with album titles, with Chronicles of a Bohemian Teenager pretty bad and Searching For The Hows And Whys even worse, while his song titles occasionally stretch towards the dangerous territory of emo in their length and pretentiousness. Thankfully, the songs themselves are still mostly very down to earth, with Duckworth getting by on his own merits and fairly subtle help from producer Nitin Sawney. Get Cape songs have always had that little extra sparkle in terms of instrumention (brass sections, etc) and that has been turned up a little notch here, but it's hardly a massive leap forward from Chronicles in terms of production values. Maybe it should have been, because that could have hidden some of the deficiencies in the songs and Duckworth's singing. His first album cruised past those problem areas with the passion in his voice and lyrics and the contrast with the colourful musical landscapes he mixed them with, but second time around the charm just isn't there. The lyrics have moved on from the small town observances of his debut to more worldly issues, never more so than on I Could Build You A Tower, which is one of the most depressing things ever: "I could build you a tower, I could set you apart from all the wars and the violence towards the pure of heart. I could build you a tower, but they'll only burn it down." And that's the upbeat chorus, the rest of it goes into wars and massacres and terrorism and makes you not want to go outside. Unless you live in a tower, which is going to be burned down, so you may as well go outside. So much of this album makes you feel like this, and the contrast between that and the music itself is just too much this time, particularly as most of the songs are all pretty much the same and aren't that memorable, while his vocals have a bit more of an irritating whine and yelp to them. Overall, a very disappointing return.

Neon Neon - Stainless Style

There can't be many concept albums written about the heads of motor car companies, which means Stainless Style by Neon Neon something of a one-off. It's already that just by being an album that sees LA-based electro-whizz Boom Bip (that's not his real name) joining up with Gruff Rhys from Super Furry Animals. Quite how they came to work together or decided to make an album about John DeLorean (as in the DeLorean car from Back To The Future) is unclear, but certainly he is well worthy of this kind of accolade, having lived quite a life: "He was on the cusp of being a genius and a madman. He was like the Britney Spears of car manufacturing," explains Rhys. That sums up Neon Neon too really, as they spend most of Stainless Style on the cusp of both madness and genius, with some truly fantastic moments of 80s-influenced electro-pop music and some utterly bizarre and dire tracks that are clearly a few experiments too far. But it is so often thus with Rhys' day band, so it is no surprise that Neon Neon misfire at times too, and it is very easy to see where they go wrong here. Basically, it's whenever they step out of the power-pop box and throw some hip-hop shapes with guests like Spank Rock, Yo Majesty and Fat Lip. These tracks - Trick For Treat, Sweat Shop and Luxury Pool - just don't work on their own and are even less successful as part of this album and that's a real shame because everything else here is great. Rhys has a voice with more character than beauty, but he uses it to great crooning effect on shimmering ballads like Belfast and Steel Your Girl, while single I Lust U is an awesome duet with Cate Le Bon that is one of the best release of this year so far. Stainless Style had the potential to be similarly successful, but like DeLorean himself, it reaches just a bit too far and its flaws are what bring it down from greatness. But like his life and his cars, it's a fun ride.