We Are Scientists - Brain Thrust Mastery

Call it snobbery, but this isn't quite what these ears expected. Though never the worst band in the world, there was always something strikingly smug about We Are Scientists' knowingly geeky exterior and loaded - if repetitive - tunes. It reeked of marketing strategy. So what's changed? From the Neo-Muse-esque opener, Ghouls, to the 80s embracing, Erasure-aping, Lethal Enforcer, Scientists are happy to display a host of old and new influences. Their weakness for a riff hasn't disappeared, but in Let's See It and the excellent single, After Hours, they've learned to tone it down; they realise you don't have to play it to death for it to catch on. Alas, there are still a few relative duds here (Impatient, That's What Counts) and lead singer Keith Murray still struggles occasionally when he opens his larynx. So while all is not quite forgiven, Brain Thrust Mastery has plenty of redeeming features to warrant the extension of an olive branch. [Finbarr Bermingham]