The Real Tuesday Weld's acclaimed 2004 debut, I, Lucifer, soundtracked Glen Duncan's novel around the devil's return to earth. The London Book of the Dead brews a similar mix of the mythic and the macabre, with more than a dash of music hall. A pianissimo plays a simple repeated phrase. A bell chimes. A half-whispered voice croons, as if on a scratched track record: "Life is good when you're filled with blood, life is good when you're filled with sexual love." What follows is a collage of honky-tonk piano, strings, samples, soaring clarinet, jaunty banjo and, amid it all, the timeworn elegance of Stephen Coates's voice. In the centre, things sag down a little, and the Cole Porter parody Kix falls monotone. What's wanting is the fun of the deliriously bubbly Bathtime in Clerkenwell (from I, Lucifer), or the wilful craziness of their MySpace remix of Crazy in Love. But this fertile and strange album is surely one of the week's near intriguing offerings.
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