'Made in Doncaster' is the sole production credit, writ large in a wavering hand on the inner sleeve. It's a jibe at the rather less-than-lovely northern town's expense, sure, but also an affectionate and meaningful one, since Relaxed Muscle are bound to it both geographicallyand artistically.
The duo - Jarvis Cocker (performing vocal duties under the alias of Darren Spooner) and Jason Buckle (real name, music) - have respectively called Sheffield and Doncaster home, which means a local history of leftfield electronic music from Cabaret Voltaire through The Human League to Fat Truckers (with whom Buckle once played) is theirs for the plundering. And plunder it they do, but with enough verve, wit and creative savvy to twist it all their own wonderful way.
Relaxed Muscle is very much more than a post-Pulp vanity project for father and Paris resident Cocker. It was in fact Buckle who suggested he provide lyrics and vocals for his music and 'A Heavy Nite With...' is a fully rounded affair. A concept album of sorts, it starts like one of the nights out it describes, upbeat and full of promise, but winds up drunk and despairing at 4am. Enormous fun but far from frivolous, simple as only the most physical rock can be yet not simple-minded, satisfyingly heavy but never ham-fisted, it's a neat conceptual see-sawing of hedonism and the inevitable comedown, set to a rough electro soundtrack spiked with glam, swamp rock and metal.
Opener 'The Heavy' staggers in and sets the grubby, grinding tone, with Spooner rasping, 'Jesus Christ, it's only half eleven' in a voice that's equal parts porno menace and paranoia. 'Tuff It Out' is 'Kick Out The Jams' as delivered by The Sensational Alex Harvey Band joining Human League while 'Muscle Music' appropriates Adam And The Ants' percussive clatter. 'Sexualized' - which attacks the ubiquity of sex-focused advertising - is sheer, glitter-booted joy, a barrage of distorted synth squalls and savagely serrated guitar anchored by the boogie drive of T-Rex. 'Battered' is the album's wild card, a strikingly simple, compellingly downbeat lament of Arab Strap-like poignancy that precedes closer 'Mary', a bleakly funny cri de coeur from a hammered but hurting Spooner to his estranged wife.
'Every note is forged from sweat,' claims Spooner on 'Muscle Music'. That might be a tongue-in-cheek boast, but if 'A Heavy Nite With...' has been hard work, then it's more than amply paid off.
