Joined Up Talking (25th Anniversary)

My Life Story's third album confirmed just two things: the first was the sheer brilliance of the band (which we already knew, but it's nice to be sure); and the second, the sheer hopelessness of their situation. Bad enough, after all, that a string of past singles had already drifted by with nothing better than a number 27 chart placing ("Strumpet" to show for it. But when the exquisite "It's a Girl Thing" followed them into the dumper that is the lowest reaches of the U.K. Top 40, then you knew it was all over. Joined Up Talking is not, song for song, a match to its predecessor, the effervescent Golden Mile, but it can certainly hold its own. The opening "Empire Line" packs the first of a mini battalion of killer choruses; the succeeding "If You Can't Live Without Me, Why Aren't You Dead Yet?" the latest in a long line of memorable Jake Shillingford song titles; and, up next, "It's a Girl Thing," a song that is essentially an amalgam of every great record the band had made to date, wrapped within a bristling ball of electrifying electro-lushness. True, it reminds us just how great a debt Shillingford owes to the lyrical likes of Joe Jackson and early Elvis Costello, but there were a lot worse role models around in 2000 -- and most of them were topping the chart. Joined Up Talking will delight anyone who's already been lured into the bruised romantic world of Mornington Crescent and The Golden Mile, and it'll thrill everyone who's ever lost their heart on the bus ride to work, and wishes the incident had been set to music. It has now. ~ Dave Thompson