Dirt Track Odyssey [Audio CD] Dust (Herbalizer)

Dust comes six months after they downed tools for Ninja Tune loungecore merchants The Herbaliser and knocked out an impressive debut album of their own as the Easy Access Orchestra. Andrew Ross and Ralph Lamb return with a second album under a different moniker. New musical companion Adam Philips brings a rich line in vocals together with a clankering guitar, which sets this body of work some distance from the soundtracked down-tempo instrumentals that characterised their previous material. The resultant tracks, while still dripping with rising orchestration and eye wateringly crystalline melodics, see Philips making the logical next step--with 10 songs which sound like they've been kicking around since the 60s--think Portishead jamming in an Arizona truck populated by The Eagles together with Mick, Keith, Charlie and Bill where Ry Cooder and Brian Wilson serve up the coffee and you wouldn't be too far away. Dust's drive through the desert could be the sleeping hit of 2002--don't miss. --Kingsley Marshall