The Independent from London, Greater London, England • 44

DISCS HIP-HOP Goldie Lookin' Chain Safe as Fuck ATLANTIC POP Paul McCartney Chaos and Creation in the Backyard PARLOPHONE CLASSICAL HIP-HOP Blackalicious The Craft ANTIQUANNUM Korngold The Sea, Wolf The Adventures of Robin Hood -SBC PhilhormonkfGamba CHANDOS Double standards affect the way we regard writers and composers who went to Hollywood in the Thirties and Forties. Fitzgerald, Parker and Agee were tragic victims of the machine, yet the emigre composers who were driven out of Europe are seen as whores. In the case of Erich whose Hollywood career Was bookerided by periods in art music, this is particularly unfair, as RumonGamba's shapely BBC Phil recording of his atmospheric score for TteSea Wolf shows. The 'playing here is beautifully shaded and balanced; the inclusion of the hokey Hood, the sole disappointment Anna Picard All that weed is taking its toll. Eggsy is losing his memory Term) and The Maggot's growing breasts but the Goldie Lookin brain still functions as sick as ever.

(I am advised by lawyers that it is inadvisable to quote "Bad Boy Limp'O Every voice, from the one in your own head to the media backlash, is telling you that the joke's over and Safe as Fuck should be a turkey. But the reason that the Newport rap crew's second album will strike a chord with the same audience who bought Greatest Hits is that this is haw people are living: dodging fights in chain pubs, being savaged by attack dogs, trying to avoid the coppers when you're stoned and, er, falling in love with chimps at Bristol Zoo. The laughs are laughs of recognition (well, apart from the chimp thing). Safe. is more of the same, essentially: puerile, undeniably funny tall tales on top of samples from Eddie Floyd, Grange Hill, Aled Jones and (brilliantly) Serge Gainsbourg.

This time around, GLG are branching out into parody, targeting commercial dance music boy hands vocoder house and love ballads "If you leave me now, can 1 fuck your sister and your best Simon Price Already one of the most talented, thoughtful, woefully underrated hip-hop acts around, this West Coast duo have taken it to the next level on their third album to join the ranks of those who've done something genuinely innovative with the form, without being selfconsciously experimental or loosening their grip on a beat thafs essentially funky. Chief Xcel's muKifaceted production is the perfect fit for Gift of Gab's Witty, mildly hippyish lyrics, underpinning and accenting his complex narratives and dazzling flights of freestyled fancy. Laurence Phelarf "Would you care to sit with me For a cup of English tea Very twee, very Mawkish whimsy has always been McCartney's stock in trade, and is no different. Produced by Nigel Godrich (Radiohead) with arrangements by Joby Talbot (The Divine Comedy), and largely recorded at Air Studios (Oasis, McCartney played nearly everything himself, and the resonant production is an attempt to recapture the late-Sixties sound of The Beatles. One track, "This Never Happened is interesting, but only if you pretend ifs about erectile dysfunction.

SP DUB Jah Wobble Mu TROJAN POP David Gray Life in Slow Motion ATLANTIC A sweep of strings heralds the return of David Gray, the Mozart of MOR to James Blunt's Safieri (ie sincere genius vs suspect imitator). Aided by producer Marius (RufusWainwrighQ deVries, Gray casts aside the homespun, acousticvibe that made himso successful, irt favour of a string-laden, cinematicambience. Indeed, Life in Slow Motion is made-to-rneasurefilm music, full of bittersweet melodies that won't take no for an answer, with a cast of countless true loves, long-lost loves and about-to-leave loves: perfect for one of those London rom-coms that culminates with someone blubbing Into a pint glass. Leonard he. aint but 1 cant quite bring; myself to hate himfor it Luiza Sauma REGGAE Damian Marley Welcome to Jomrock TUFF GONGUNIVERSAL Bob's youngest son (from the famous union with Cindy Breaks pea re, Miss Jamaica 1977) is more of a shouter than a singer, but his pleasing voice and witty rhymes grow on you, as proved by continued exposure to the hit-single title track, an attack on island corruption and violence that could have been written in the era of his dad.

There's the usual over-abundance of guests, including Nas, Bounty Killer and Eek-A-Mouse, but what makes the album distinctive is its open-eared production style, heard to best effect in "Beautif comic mix of great rhythms, rude lyrics and dirty sax. Phil Johnson: FOLK-POP Devendra Banhart Cripple Crow XL Still one defiantly odd hippie, the travelling troubadour with the Bolan-esque falsetto now finds himself at the forefront of the "free folk" movement. To celebrate, this (Banharfs fourth full-length album in three years) is a sprawling, experimental and partially triumphant evolution of the vibe. In place of the Pink Moon-era Nick Drake sound of previous efforts, Cripple Crow embraces gypsy music, psychedelia, Stax-style soul and most stops in between. It's impossible to know how seriously Banhart wants us to take it all, but for eccentric pop pleasure there are few who can match him.

Simmy Richman BOCK Bonnie Raitt Souls. Alike CAPITOL. It's cut from the same cloth as 20035 Silver Lining, which means greater Little Featsy chunk than was the case during Raitt's commercial glory years and more Which is all very well but the greatest ginger American has an awful weakness far a steadfast-yet-droopy musical vibe, a vibe with its own in-built drag-chute Souls Alike is so persistent in its droopy-blues leanings that the illusion arises that every song is played in the same key and at the. same tempo. Before long you are dozing along in minor, This is, of course, only a trick of the light.

"Trinkets" has a kind of anecdotal life to it. And the playing's lovely. NC BOCK Echo the Bunnymen Siberia COOKING VINYL Nice sound, nice hair, nice shame about the lyrics. That Was always the problem with the. Bunnymen.

While Will Sergeant, Les Pattinsofi and Pete De Freitas worked tirelessly to create some of the. mast crystalline music of the post-punk era, lan McCulloch seemed content to scribble any old junk on the back. of an envelope 10 minutes before the studialight went red. A quarter-century later, the Bunnymen have barely changed. The intertwining of McCulloch'svoice and Sergeant's guitar still works, but the former has no great wisdom to impart, and the tatter's music makes these songs sound more profound than: they actually are.

SP POP Broadcast Tender Buttons WARP Birmingham's Broadcast have quietly been making psychedelic-space-age-electro-pop for the best part of a decade. After half of the band jumped ship, James Cargill and singer Trish Keenan holed themselves up in a home studio to produce Tender Buttons; an album in Keenan's words on "the theme of letting The result? A hypnotic, impossibly lovely work of near-perfection, held together by addictive tunes and melancholy-sweet vocals. "Back Cat" is the Velvet Underground Nico jamming with Stereolab, while "Corporeal" is a sedated Goldfrapp: bored, glitchy and sexy as hell. US 16 JAZZ Greg Osby Channel Three After dipping histoesback into the "tradition" with his last album, Osby takes, his toffee-edged alto sax into Choppier waters With this, trio album As he writes in the liner notes; 'Where's the piano?" Accompanied by his regular bassist. Matt Brewer, and the evef-excellent Jeff Tain" Watts on drums, Osby largely succeeds in producing a cohesive result even without an instrument to provide harmony.

Dsbys fluent in a rather non-period-orientated fashion -comparisons made to Ornette Coleman are seriously wide of the mark- and the sound of his sax is gorgeous. But the piano is missed onthiscleverbut rather empty album. Shotto Byrnes WORLD Cummin Achododos Perdidos ANTI The crude metallic twang of a banjo rubs shoulders with the retro-buzz of a synthesizer, and an elastic samba rhythm parties away unfazed in the background. More than half of the instruments here including some mercurial bass, drums and the previously mentioned banjo and keyboards -are played by its young Brazilian creator. But this doesn't sound like a studio-bound project ifs tough, funky and alive.

Curumin was brought up in SSo Paulo by JapaneseSpanish parents, on a musical diet ranging from Devo to Jorge Ben. On this, his first album, he does justice to his eclectic influences. Howard Male 18 SEPTEMBER 2005 THE INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY Nothing especially new here, but nothing undesirable either. This is the Wobbler in esoteric-but-friendly mode, re-sowing a 5J. dub project in ordinary stereo sod, cross-fertilising Western root-growth with the flowers of the East.

"Kojak if you please, rolls out flute riffage with a lollipop of a bass part, pipes, string pad and Seventies quacks. Then ifs the viola and sarangi title track, which is quite lovely, and the Barbie-oriental "Buddha of which travels on a dated ambientbig-beat TV-ad chassis. Only fools like me find themselves longing for the motorised tippy-tap of Jaki Liebezeit. Nick Coleman CLASSICAL Biber Missa Christi resurgentis The English ConcertManze harmqnia mundi Requiem aside, Biber's choral writing suffers from comparison with his imaginatively scored instrumental works. Regardless of the number of instruments and voices I nvolved, major is major is Gmajor.Sothis lovely recording of the intimate and varied Missa Christi resurgentis is a pleasant surprise The solo voices of The English Concert are well cast, With ethereal sopranos, warm altos, bright tenors, and basses of burnished appeal.

Though Manze's super-lean sound divides listeners, the playing is also very fine The lower strings have a toffeeish twang, while the brass playing is glorious. AP.