ALICE IN ULTRALAND

My mother told me that if you can't say anything polite, it's best to say nothing at all. I'm afraid I won't be taking her advice.

Not content with the most extreme change of direction in the history of music - from techno to 60's psychedelic prog rock - AMORPHOUS ANDROGYNOUS aka FUTURE SOUND OF LONDON went further and produced a second psychedelic disc a couple of years after the first. Where the first disc (The Isness) had power, this is flaccid. Where The Isness had beauty, this has mundanity. And where The Isness gave us the sounds of nostalgia, this gives us - well, ill-considered noise. Apart from the first track, a prelude to disappointment, this album is uniformly without merit. It was as though their market research had led DOUGAN and COBAINS to believe all their listeners wanted was a 'sound-alike' record. We still get the wide variety of instruments, most from the East, the electronica is still as weird as ever and the production is sumptuous, but these parts do not make a cohesive whole. Moreover, there are virtually no songs here. No meaning to attach to these sounds of the 60s. 'The World Is Full Of Plankton' raises its head for a moment above the primordial ooze, but that's about it for this record.

There's only room in your collection for one faux-sixties psychedelic sound-alike record, and it ought to be 'The Isness'. Do not be tempted to buy this.