Sorted

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The first wave of U.K. punk bands almost to a man had trouble with second albums; from the Clash'sGive 'Em Enough Rope to the Damned's Music for Pleasure to the Adverts' Cast of Thousands and beyond, second albums were awkward, tentative affairs, admirably unwilling to simply repeat what had worked the first time around (those that did, like the Jam's spotty This Is the Modern World, were generally weak), but equally unsure of what should happen next. Interestingly, this also happened to Manchester punks the Drones, which is particularly surprising since their second album, Sorted, wasn't written and recorded until 21 years after their debut! Only singer Mike Howells and guitarist Gus Callender remain from the original '70s lineup, but seeing as they were the band's creative core all along, the use of a different rhythm section doesn't harm anything. What does hurt is the generally lackluster songwriting, which rarely ventures out of a comfort zone of three-minute midtempo guitar rock tunes that remind the historically knowledgeable listener that prior to their 1977 punk epiphany, the Drones were just another average pub rock group. The problem is that the few originals that most closely resemble vintage punk, most notably the sneering "Dirty Bastards," sound terribly forced. The pair of covers, the Motown classic "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" (already forever connected to the Slits when it comes to U.K. punk covers) and a drastically shortened take on Don McLean's "American Pie," are simply really bad ideas. The Drones are hardly the most obscure of the first wave U.K. punk bands to re-form in the aftermath of the '90s punk revival, but unfortunately, Sorted does not answer any pressing musical questions that had been left hanging in the intervening decades.

© Stewart Mason /TiVo