Yahoo! Music Album Review

Released on 22/06/09
Label: Sony

Following their one and only, "Skins"-endorsed hit a few years ago, the Gossip signed to a major label for the sort of massive, tea-spluttering fee that would send an Ecuadorian to the moon and back. That "Standing In The Way Of Control" only ever reached number seven on its third attempt (it peaked at 64 and 13 previously), and that the band's three singles since have struggled to tickle the Top 50, further highlights the risk to both label (who aren't Yahoo! Music's concern) and group (who are).

It's only a slightly (slightly!) more sensible deal than that reported to have been done with those other well-known unit-shifters, Gallows. But it's not the readies now lining the pockets of the Gossip's natty new threads that give cause for concern, it's the pressure the trio are under to achieve (read: sell a skip load) and the expectation that's been heaped upon them by the rest of us. Frankly, they're just not remarkable enough to carry the weight.

Before their last outing, the Gossip were a blues-punk band playing broken instruments, travelling in a van, signed to the defiantly independent (read: broke) US imprint Kill Rock Stars and doing it for kids with catholic tastes and outsider beliefs. Constant touring, a desire to give "their" society a voice and hectoring by "normals" along the way turned them into a tight, totally righteous outfit, and everything came together on "Standing In The Way Of Control". Truly it was smashing.

But for every clean noun (disco, soul) there was an earthy counterpoint: grubby, serrated, punky and, ultimately, f*ck-you. It wasn't disco-pop and it wasn't chart-fodder, and sadly for them - and their label - attempts to make them so with the help of Rick Rubin has resulted in a record that sounds similar to the last but with the heart ripped out.

With their personalities neutered, the songwriting falls disappointingly flat. Brace Paine's staccato guitar, from "Dimestore Diamond" to "8th Wonder" and beyond (well, pretty much every song actually), sounds limp and forced like something from a Hard-Fi song. The disco-lite of "Love And Let Love" is too restrained for even supermarket shoppers and Ditto's insistence on singing about love, most glibly on "Love Long Distance", means even her pipes aren't used to the best of their rallying potential.

A few moments threaten to shine, like "Pop Goes The World" and sax-blasted "Spare Me From The Mold", but lead single "Heavy Cross", itself almost a Xerox of their greatest moment, sums things up nicely: the burden is simply too heavy for them to bare.

    by Chris Parkin