By RUSSELL BAILLIE
On debut Remedy, London beat boffins Felix Buxton and Simon Ratcliffe delivered one of 1999's best - an album that rose above the dance genres it mashed together and did it with both cracking tunes and anything-goes playfulness.
For their next trick, they've taken that blueprint and painted
it purple with paisley trimmings.
Yes, they've gone a bit Prince, successfully fusing the former great's mix of sex-funk and pop-bent into about half of the tracks here.
Their punchy, choppy house beats might do something for the feet, but quite a lot of the rest is aimed at parts a little higher on the anatomical chart - especially the amusingly lascivious, and hard-thumping Get Me Off.
And there's other Prince-bits palpable in the vocoder-silliness and jerky funk of Breakaway, the nutty boudoir-soul of SFM, and the twitchy electropop of Crazy Girl.
It does do things more redolent of their debut on the likes of infectious opener Romeo (complete with very 80s "Ooweeoo" backing vocal), the sunny house of Jus 1 Kiss, the ska-chugging All I Know, the gospel piano-powered stomper Do Your Own Thing, and the shouty rabble-rouser that is first single Where's Your Head At?
But altogether, it feels like a sum-of-its-parts affair.
For all its cleverly borrowed Princeliness - should some royalties go to royalty? - and spark, it's no Remedy II.
Still, it's an enjoyable cure-all for contemporary funk deprivation. Just not a particularly addictive one.
Label: Xl Recordings
