The Tindersticks - The Hungry Saw

The Man in Amsterdam waxes lyrical about Devotchka's lovely record. Annoyingly, they were a bit forgettable on Later… (mind you, so were Portishead)

Thinking of the Devotchka's sound, which makes the Yes think of fine Bavarian clockwork, for no good reason (and a host of poor ones), we offer up The Tindersticks' fine new album The Hungry Saw (Beggar's Banquet). It's their first record in five years and, yes, Stuart still has that endearingly mumbly-whuh voice of his in full effect (the title track has him mumbling low-down and then mumbling high-up). Oh, but the shades here - it's a rich and dark and velvety album, like The The's Dusk without the aggro. There are so many chewy chocolately chord progressions here, swishing like the plushest brocade (to mix metaphors with cavalier abandon).

Somehow, I like this even more than Simple Pleasure, which snuck out of nowhere to become one of the best of 1999.