Mother & The Addicts Science Fiction Illustrated CD

Despite its glammed-up name and by-default futuristic title, the thing about Mother & the Addicts' second album is how comfortable it is with its style -- rough, slightly lo-fi indie rock with dance tendencies that could have been recorded just as easily in 1990 as 2007. In a world of Hot Chip and the Klaxons trying to weld shamble with preset grooves that just seem to call to mind Jesus Jones wondering what exactly rave was, Mother & the Addicts don't break the mold by much, and what's ultimately frustrating about Science Fiction Illustrated is that the band is so clearly stunted in the beats it uses. After so many worldwide reinventions of funk, from hip-hop's predominance through to any number of regional scenes, there's something unavoidably weedy and stiff about songs like "Watch the Lines," something removed universes away from what's pouring out of speakers worldwide -- even more overtly "rock" acts like Franz Ferdinand and the White Stripes have busted out better dance moves. Meantime, it doesn't help at all that the best song on the album, "So Tough," is an obvious fusion of Pulp and Saint Etienne circa 1993 (the song title, also the name of the latter band's second album, surely wasn't chosen due to coincidence) that ends up being headshaking not because it is so obvious -- any number of bands have acted similarly with their own touchstones -- but because nothing about it sounds like a change or an advance on what they've put together. Plenty of other musical comfort food moves like that crop up throughout, and in their own context -- a mostly horrifying U.K. rock scene for the first decade of this century -- Mother & the Addicts show a slight ambition. But when an old warhorse like Section 25 can come back the same year with a monstrous album in Part-Primitiv sounding both more righteously energetic and armed with stronger beats, Science Fiction Illustrated suffers by comparison on more than one level. ~ Ned Raggett

Despite its glammed-up name and by-default futuristic title, the thing about Mother & the Addicts' second album is how comfortable it is with its style -- rough, slightly lo-fi indie rock with dance tendencies that could have been recorded just as easily in 1990 as 2007. In a world of Hot Chip and the Klaxons trying to weld shamble with preset grooves that just seem to call to mind Jesus Jones wondering what exactly rave was, Mother & the Addicts don't break the mold by much. The best song on the album, "So Tough," is an obvious fusion of Pulp and Saint Etienne circa 1993 (the song title, also the name of the latter band's second album, surely wasn't chosen due to coincidence). Plenty of other musical comfort food moves like that crop up throughout, and in their own context -- a mostly horrifying U.K. rock scene for the first decade of this century -- Mother & the Addicts show a slight ambition. ~ Ned Raggett

Recording information: Chem 19 Studios (2006).

Personnel: Sam Smith (vocals, guitar, saxophone, synthesizer, drums, percussion); Douglas Morland (guitar, background vocals); Jamie Savage (piano); Ian Cronan (drums); Peter Vallely (background vocals).

Audio Mixer: Paul Savage.