Basement Jaxx - Crazy Itch Radio
Album ReviewsMore 'Crazy Kitsch' than 'Crazy Itch', fans will probably delight in the ramshackle of it all, while the rest of us will just dance along to the singles.
XL Recordings, 4th September 2006 / By Cameron Clarke
Hard as it may be to believe, but stranger marriages lie in wait on Basement Jaxx's fourth studio album 'Crazy Itch Radio', than in their almost repellent summer supporting of 'Rudeboxer' in chief Robbie Williams on his world tour.But then, we didn't fall in love with Basement Jaxx in the first place for being plain and dull. From the housed up George Formby of forthcoming single 'Take Me Back To Your House', a standout alone for putting banjos onto the nation's dancefloors, to the girl power hollering of Lady Marga on the carnival flavoured, 'Run For Cover', it's still impossible to put Basement Jaxx down to type.
Themed in the style of a pirate radio broadcast, you could arguably call this a Jaxx 'concept album'. The radio skits though, add little overall and soon begin to grate, denying 'Crazy Itch' its natural flow and breaking up the party vibe.
On occasions though, the groove is unshakable. Inspired after compiling 'Gypsy Beats & Balkan Bangers', Felix B lends Europe's most outrageous new style to 'Hey You', a joyous crashing together of Gypsy rhythm, and the kind of electro-licks last heard on Adamski's 'Killer'.
It's not just the Eastern European flavour that the Jaxx seem to have borrowed from elsewhere though. The old-school R&B flow of 'On The Train', with a delightful and oh so-Cee-Lo silky vocal draped over it, sounds so akin to Gnarls Barkley that it wouldn't sound out of place as any of the ones that aren't 'Crazy' on 'St. Elsewhere'.
Being preceded by a greatest hits collection only reminds us that the Jaxx are most prominent as a singles band, and there isn't enough here to knot the album together as a substantial body of work. More 'Crazy Kitsch' than 'Crazy Itch', fans will probably delight in the ramshackle of it all, while the rest of us will just dance along to the singles.
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