James Blunt - All Those Lost Souls

Having released the song most universally despised since Chris de Burgh's Lady In Red, James Blunt must have been tempted at times in the last year or so to just pack in this music lark and live off the profits of Back To Bedlam on Ibiza, cavorting with whichver young blonde thing happened to cross his path that day. Indeed, having released the biggest-selling album of the millennium, he really didn't need to do another one, and he even admits in the accompanying press release that he approached this new record from the perspective of not expecting it to sell anywhere near the 11 million copies that his last one did. That's probably wise, given that 10 million of those sales were to people who fell in love with You're Beautiful and now wish they could have it surgically removed from their memories. Sneakily, the first single released from this album was the MOR but not completely awful 1973, which also opens proceedings here, and it is not bad really, in a very inoffensive and bland way. If it wasn't by James Blunt, some might even have thought that it was quite good, but you can't get away from that voice, and neither can he, which means that songs that could otherwise not sound too bad, like I'll Take Everything, get mauled into something vaguely hateful by his warbling. The thing with James Blunt is that his songs aren't automatically dislikeable, but there's just something bland and offensively inoffensive about them, particularly as there are so many ballads here that just seem to ache to be this year's I'm Beautiful or Goodbye My Lover, without really having the hooks necessary to be them, while when he tries something slightly more upbeat, like Give Me Some Love, it just sounds awkward and forced, as well as just a little bit too American, like he is deliberately marketing himself to an audience who took him into their hearts like they so rarely do for British 'sensations' these days. You can't blame him for that, of course, but it makes it all feel less than sincere, which was one of the few things going for him first time round. Not that his lyrics were ever much good, though it has to be said that at least he avoids the mistake of starting a song with a line as guaranteed to annoy everyone as 'My life is brilliant' this time. Annie's 'But the walls came tumbling down, down. Will you go down on me?' is rather disturbing, but otherwise the lyrics are pretty pointless. It's difficult to predict how well this album will do, other than to say that obviously it won't be as successful as the first one, and nor will it convert anyone, with most people likely to be put off by an album cover that shows Blunt's face made up of lots of little pictures of himself. Those who aren't and have stayed loyal to him despite the mass loathing will finds lots here that they like, so he'll do alright.

The Rumble Strips - Girls And Weather

Tipped by those people who make such suggestions to be this year's version of The Kooks or The Fratellis, The Rumble Strips haven't quite made the impact of either of their bands with their singles so far, so they will hope that this debut album can tip them over the edge from hopefuls to bonafide indie superstars. Hailing from Devon, their music certainly has a very sunny disposition to it, which makes its belated release in mid-September seem strange when the brassy horns sound like they could have been the soundtrack to many a summer. When their formula works, like on the excellent Alarm Clock, it is infectiously feelgood in a way that very few British bands have managed since prime era Dexy's Midnight Runners or perhaps Madness and The Rumble Strips certainly owe a debt to both of those bands, particularly Dexy's. Singles like Girls And Boys In Love and Motorcycle, which were a bit too short to make much of an impact on their own, fit in well in the course of an album and the mood of exuberant joie de vivre is carried throughout. It doesn't always work though, and what this album lacks is a real stand-out moment, a song that can the one to bring them to a larger audience, because, as previously mentioned, the singles that have been released already haven't been strong enough to stand up on their own. There's certainly no Alright here to make this their I Should Coco, but there are some excellent tunes like Oh Creole, the bouncy Time and the E Street Band-esque saxophone-led Hate Me (You Do). Despite that Springsteen influence, Girls And Weather is a very English album, and even that song probably owes more to The Zutons than The Boss. It's not a great album, lacking a bit of variety here and there, but The Rumble Strips are certainly a fun band who stand out from the crowd, so they deserve credit for that.

Scouting For Girls - Scouting For Girls

Not many albums are as divisive in terms of writing a review as the self-titled debut by Scouting For Girls. There are lots of songs on here that we really do like a lot, and they have a real knack of writing pretty indie pop songs, but they also have a tendency to churn out absolutely hideous indie rock dross, so it is quite hard to come to a firm decision about them. This is summed up by the first two tracks alone, with opener Keep On Walking a very mature and impressive little tune, while recent single She's So Lovely is just teeth-itchingly annoying, with its chorus of "She's so lovverly" making you want to smash singer Roy Stride over the head with his piano. In case you hadn't noticed, Scouting For Girls follow the Keane pattern of not having a guitarist (well, they have a bassist, but you know what we mean) and when it works, like on the endearingly simple The Airplane Song, it can be very good, but too many times it gets irritating, and closing track James Bond manages to be both at the same time, with a nice tune ruined by cliched lyrics about wanting to be 007 and get the chicks. Immediately following it is a secret song about unrequited love for Michaela Strachan, but by that stage Scouting For Girls have just been too inconsistent to make a real impact. There's hope for them yet, but this is a decidedly patchy and rather too lightweight debut.

The Dykeenies - Nothing Means Everything

There may be some Scottish brothers in The Dykeenies, but they certainly sound nothing like The Proclaimers. The problem they do have is that at times, it's difficult to work out exactly what the Henderson siblings and their band-mates actually do sound like. The Cumbernauld kids have been slowing building up quite a young fanbase for themselves with gigs and singles like Stitches and New Ideas, but Nothing Means Everything is a bit of a curious debut album because it seems so unfocused and spends too much time leaping from genre to genre like Tom Cruise leaping around Oprah Winfrey's sofa, and often with about as much charm. Opening track The Panic is an all-out rocker that gets things off to a raucous, jagged start with a chanting refrain reminiscent of The Automatic's Monster, if slightly less effective. In Waiting For Go, there are hints of some experimentation with synthesisers, but it is otherwise a fairly run of the mill indie track about wanting to break free and escape from small-town life. The real shift in gears comes with Stitches, where The Dykeenies suddenly metamorphose into Athlete or Snow Patrol with an indie power ballad, and then follow it up with the equally anthemic Clean Up Your Eyes, leaving you wondering who changed the CD without you noticing, so far removed is it from The Panic. And then it happens again, with the trancey start to Pick You Up making you briefly wonder if the new Underworld single has found its way onto The Dykeenies album by mistake. Nothing Means Everything certainly showcases their varied talents, but it is all just a bit too disparate to really enjoy and while the ADD-addled youth of today will probably lap it up, it's far from a great debut album.

Terra Naomi - Under The Influence

It's been a little while since a new Alanis clone appeared on the market, and it looked like her influence on female singer-songwriters was starting to wane, but Terra Naomi is here to change all that. She's even called her album Under The Influence, but missed out the end part ... Of Jagged Little Pill. A teenage classical pianist, Naomi also has a degree in opera, but then caught the rock bug, bought a guitar and started writing songs about relationships, men, cheating and global warming. Eh? Yes, the latter subject comes up in her breakthrough song Say It's Possible, inspired by Al Gore's documentary An Inconvenient Truth, and after hearing it, Gore invited Naomi to play at Live Earth. Second single Not Sorry shows her more inward-looking side, and is the song that bears most lyrical resemblance to Morissette, being told from the brutally frank position of being some guy's 'other woman', though strangely the music is less Jagged Little Pill and more like modern, happier Alanis. It is slightly unfair to keep mentioning Ms Morissette, because while Naomi certainly owes a lot to both her and Sheryl Crow for the style of music she makes, she is clearly very talented and Under The Influence is a strong enough album on its own merits to stand up for itself. Tracks like Flesh For Bones, Something Good To Show You and I'm Happy show that Terra Naomi has the potential to be an Alanis for a whole new generation (after all, Jagged Little Pill came out well over a decade ago now), so she deserves that chance.

Passenger - Wicked Man's Rest

Passenger are a band who have been around for a little while now releasing singles without many people really noticing, but with the release of their debut album, we can finally realise what a good band they actually are. Lead singer and songwriter Mike Rosenberg (the band used to be named after him) has a voice that could turn some people off, quite fragile in a Mark Owen/James Blunt (gasp!) manner, but it fits his songs perfectly. Recent single Walk You Home is a good example, with his sweet lickle voice and lines like 'I see you nearly everyday but you don't see me' making it sound like a heartbreaking tale of unrequited love rather than a sinister song about a stalker. His voice comes into effect even more on Stray Dog, which seems to be a tragic tune sung from the perspective of a dog who has been forsaken by its owners and wanders the streets lost, alone and starving to death. Now come on, you can't write a song from the point of view of a dying dog, that's just too much. Seriously though, it works very well because Rosenberg's achingly sad lyrics are wrapped up in warm and pleasant surroundings by the rest of his band, who have a solid background in various genres, and manage to lift each song about being just ok. But it's Rosenberg's lyrics that are the star here, not because they are flowery or particularly deep, but because he has the knack of telling stories with them in the way Kelly Jones did on the first Stereophonics album and the way Mike Skinner has more recently been doing. The album closes with another sad tune, Table For One, all about those middle-aged men who sit in pubs drinking on their own. He doesn't come up with anything new in his analysis, but he makes you care for the duration of the song, and that's what it's all about.

Broken Social Scene Presents Kevin Drew - Spirit If...

Broken Social Scene might not have the commercial pulling power of Arcade Fire, but their indie credentials are certainly much better, as is - whisper it - their music. Their last album, self-titled, was a classic slice of indie rock defying explanation or the rules of pop music, with most of the songs sounding like there were about four bands all playing different tunes at the same time. But it worked, and each fresh listen brought out purpose behind the madness and the loose, sloppy structures. Kevin Drew is one of the key figures in the Broken Social Scene collective, and Spirit If... is kind of his first solo album. Kind of? Well, technically, as you'll see about, this is Broken Social Scene Presents Kevin Drew - Spirit If... and while he is responsible for having written the music, it has been performed by himself along with other members of BSS, and is intended to be the first in a series of 'solo' albums by them, much in the same way as those solo albums the members of Kiss all released under the band's brand in the late 70s. As you'd expect from someone who has shaped BSS down the years, Spirit If... isn't too far removed from their kind of music, though most of the noise has been stripped away to leave some loose and quite funky grooves at times, particularly on TBTF (Too Beautiful To Fuck), while tracks like Gang Bang Suicide are more sparse and elegaic. Like the parent group's albums, this is hardly music for the masses, but it is a very richly rewarding listen and one that grows with each listen. Next up in the series is his fellow founding member Brendan Canning's release, so we can already look forward to hearing what that will sound like.