Nice to see the Paxton and the Gipsy Rose Café thanked on the back of this. Recorded at RMS in Crystal Palace, this is one of the later singles and kind of a taste of things to come. The stop-start Slant Invention opens. Alison’s lyrics are so disjointed sometimes that I really don’t know what she’s talking about but when she has the ability to write glorious couplets like “you’re the source and I’m the addict” and “I watch you like you’re art, like you are”, the overall meaning come in second place.

An early version of Aerial from Crash Diagnostic opens side B and it’s better than the album version. Sparse and desperate, it’s like a bullet to the gut. The acoustic “Most Brutal Criminal” is last with a piano accompaniment. It serves as a reminder of Discount’s last shows when they played this with James on guitar. It’s quite a melancholic feeling but it’s a glorious song.

--Chris (30th Oct 2001)