Myself, I jumped aboard the Stereophonics bandwagon during their more mellow, ballad-happy days (Just Enough Education to Perform) or as I refer to it their "Green" album. That album, though superior in most ways to the two that have followed (at least in terms of thoughtful lyrics and catchy chorus hooks) does not seem to be the image that the Stereophonics wish to perpetuate. Perhaps it's their desire to distance themselves from the bands they could easily be compared to back then (Coldplay, Travis, etc), or perhaps it was their recent stint opening for David Bowie - in any case the pastoral and pensive Stereophonics of five years ago are no more and in it's place is a more rocking outfit that succeed when they are able to fuse their past tunesmanship with their new rock and roll personae ("Dakota," "Rewind") being the best examples on Language, Sex, Violence, Other.

While there's no question that singer Kelly Jones' (who shares the same name as my ex-wife) possesses a wonderfully scratchy baritone/cum/tenor well suited for this heavier rock incarnation - it's equally true that the quality of these new tracks is a good bit more spotty, and tend to lack the diversity that I found so compelling in the days of their "Green" album. The opener "Superman" gets things off to a proper start - again melding their harder posture with the melodic goods of yesterday, but the tracks that follow offer precious little pay dirt and sound like throwaway tunes from Aerosmith or the Cult. One look at the liner art and the lyric pages makes it clear that the trio of Kelly, Richard Jones and new Argentinean drummer Javier Weyler are making a concerted effort to sex things up - but this never really comes across as anything more than pretense (Louis XIV they're not) and the absence of a good hummable melody during tracks 2,3,4 leave one to wonder if these lads haven't wandered down the wrong back ally.

Alas tracks 5 and 6, the aforementioned "Dakota" and "Rewind" more than make up for this paucity with two of the most melody-driven rock tunes you'll hear all year, and after that it seems that things get back on track, and the listener will find himself tuning right back in. Their previous release You Gotta Go There To Come Back, with it's Zeppelin-esque blues-rock punch, which, (at the time) appeared to be the "one-off" "get-it-out-of-your-system" release is obviously now the true stepping-stone to the future of the Stereophonics, so fans may just as well get used to it. The album has thus far proved to be successful in their native UK, in fact it's their third consecutive chart-topper across the pond and "Dakota" has been high on the download list over the past several months. And as our resident movie guru Adam Mast reported, their set at Coachella was one of the most rousing (and rocking) performances in the lot. So much for aging gracefully. Or should I say, aging gracefully can piss off. Rock on lads!