TIM BOOTH : AMAZON REVIEW

Back from a revivifying sojourn in acting, James's former vocalist Tim Booth makes his pop re-emergence with Bone. Thankfully, this solo debut (discounting his previous endeavours with Angelo Badalamenti) does not denote a staggering change of priorities. Although Booth seems replenished with wayward notions of life and existence, his practical knack for nigglingly melodious choruses is retained and much of Bone reclaims the moonstruck Bohemian charm of James's more celebrated offerings. The scratchy guitars and four-to-the-bar piano pummelling of "Wave Hello" and the autobiograhical warts-and-all character profiling of "Discover" ("I've been abuser and I've been abused, I've been a Nazi and I've been a Jew") are joys as instantaneous as the mogadon Pet-Shop-Boys-cum-celebrity-hell mutterings of "Redneck". Warped choirs, glockenspiels, double-basses and a tendency to sound like a slightly less mad version of Robyn Hitchcock serve to sustain consumer confidence and may even disguise the fact that the title track--despite its Peter-Gabriel-style preference for ethnic percussion--sounds like one of those really rather serious Simple Minds moments.