Sloppy seconds

This week's singles roundup. I'm not infatuated with the Prince and Morrissey singles.

The Kooks - Naive

They know that I know and we all know that naiveté's got nothing to do with chicken-scratch guitars and cute accents.
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Morrissey - You Have Killed Me

Adducing Luchino Visconti and Pier Paolo Pasolini sure doesn't dampen the suspicion that Moz's self-pity has swelled to match his paunch, although clearly he wants his fans to savor these directors' taste for rough trade (since most his youngish fans are, what, 20-something Chicanos I doubt it). His voice breathless and strained, he's lucky that Tony Visconti's muscular production compensates, more Ossessione than Teorema.
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Guillemots - We're Here

Theremins, swooping backup vocals, string sections, and Laid-era James—these young aesthetes are more ambitious than Keane and Travis. Transcending their influences shouldn't be too difficult. Unless they start to believe their own press.

Massive Attack – Live With Me

Still pining for that halcyon moment when Jennifer Lynch had a film career, these men craft yet another peerlessly arranged and engineered bit of love-grunt vacuity. That their new singer sounds like Mark Antony only humidifies the air of drippy melancholia.

Prince - Black Sweat

Now that it's supercool to admit to buying his new records, what does the little guy do? Layer his matchless falsetto over a backing track Eddie Murphy would have jump, jived, and wailed on in a 1982 episode of "Saturday Night Live."
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