NOISE

Thunder, Lightning, Strike seems such a product of the recording studio, with all of its samples and weird instrumentation. Did you always envision a live element, or did the overwhelming response to the album prompt you to tour?

I always knew one day that I'd have to do it, but I never knew how. I always kind of thought, "How the f--k am I going to do this? How do I find a vocalist who gets it? And how do I find people who can play lots of different instruments?" The idea of doing it all on my own—you know, being a laptop nerd—was never an option.

So how does it translate to the stage?

It's kind of noisier than on record, bigger-sounding. I wanted the record to feel quite garagey, quite lo-fi and distorted, and that's always hard to reproduce with a live band because it turns into a mess. So I kind of see them as two different entities, but still the same songs. At first it might have looked as if we'd been just thrown together, but I think it feels quite natural now, like we are a proper band.

There are six of us, and we have lots of instruments onstage, and there's plenty of swapping. We've got two drum kits and glockenspiel and piano and banjo and harmonica, all sorts of shit going on. Then we have Ninja, our live vocalist, who's at the center of the whole operation. She kind of distracts everyone whilst we're running across the stage. And then holding it all together are the samples, [stored] in a hard drive onstage.

You had difficulty clearing some samples before you could release the album in the U.S. and even had to alter the original version. How tough was that for you to accept?

I think some of the mixes on the American album are better in places than on the U.K. version, but there are a couple of songs where we couldn't clear something, say the opening horns on "Junior Kickstart." There were about four places where we had to change things, but that was the one that hurt the most. I've still got a soft spot for the first [version of the] album, just 'cause it was guerilla album-making, a completely illegal, don't-care-about-consequences- type thing. And I'm still keeping that mind- set now. I don't think much about the publishing and financial side of it. I think about what's a good song or not.

R. Kelly's "Ignition (Remix)," still the slickest, coolest Let's get down song of this century, is a pretty perfect song about decadence. And when kids in dance clubs hear it 20 years from now, they'll probably have no idea how defiant it was when it was released in 2003. R. Kelly's predilection for encounters with underage girls had been widely reported by now, and he was indicted for child pornography in 2002, but that wasn't going to stop him from writing the most memorable come-on of his life. The man who had once inspired a nation of would-be ballers by making them believe they could fly turned his attention back to what he does best: making people want to get their freak on. "Ignition (Remix)" is playful and provocative and totally fun. And perhaps the most amazing thing about R. Kelly is that he's turned up the sexiness ever since, shimmying around all the controversy and making you think, for a handful of moments at least, that nothing could be more fun than partying with this guy. It's sick, yeah, but good art often is.

Sting Songs We (Honestly!) Don't (Totally!) Hate

We gave up hope long ago that the Sting who once wrote "Next to You" and "The Bed's Too Big Without You" might ever return. It's been an endless stream of smooth jazz and adult contemporary for years. So it's time to ask, has anything Gordon Sumner recorded since the Police actually been worthwhile? We gave the catalog a fair listen, and only three animals were injured during the process.

1. "If You Love Someone Set Them Free" (The Dream of the Blue Turtles, 1985)

A little repetitive, but so were most of the Police's biggest hits.

2. "Consider Me Gone" (The Dream of the Blue Turtles, 1985)

Abundance of synth mars the rest of the disc, but it was 1985.

3. "The Secret Marriage" (Nothing Like the Sun, 1987)

Two-minute album-capper stands up better than anything else on album No. 2.

4. "Fragilidad" (Nada Como El Sol, 1990)

Better not to understand the lyrics. Why aren't all his songs available in non-English versions?

5. "The Wild Wild Sea" (The Soul Cages, 1991)

The "Tea in the Sahara" of the solo era. It's all downhill from here.

THE DUKE SPIRIT


Cuts Across the Land (3 stars)

Frontwoman Leila Moss must be sick to death of the comparison, but it's honestly impossible not to picture PJ Harvey while listening to this London five-piece. There are far worse fates, of course, and the Duke Spirit's bluesy, indie sound makes for a satisfying overall spin, however borrowed its key elements might feel.

Evans Blue


The Melody and the Energetic Nature of Volume (2 stars)

Both annoyingly pretentious and relentlessly generic, this debut from Canada's Evans Blue is just another pathetic Tool rip-off, right at home alongside the likes of Ten Years and Earshot, two more hard-rock acts with brief radio success that you've already forgotten about.

Joe Satriani


Super Colossal (3 stars)

Fans of guitar wankery will no doubt love Satriani's latest album, which features the same virtuosic riffing and tightly polished compostions he's known for. Thankfully, Satch doesn't try anything new—like his flirtation with singing on his last album—and simply lets his guitar do the talking.