Last time out, on the impressive Gotham album, New York’s Radio 4 were doing a strikingly accurate impression of latter day Clash, all dub basslines, dance rhythms and righteous anger. Not only did it put them firmly in the city’s punk-funk lineage, it also opened a lot of doors around the world with singles such as ‘Dance To The Underground’.
All of which makes you wonder, if things were clearly not broken why have they had a not entirely successful attempt at fixing them? Stealing Of A Nation kicks off with a straight run of five tracks that take the band’s previously intoxicating sound and swamps it in a swathe of keyboard bleeps, squiggles and vocal effects.
Every song seems to work to the same template and standard four/four beat, killing any semblance of melody within. Thankfully, after twenty minutes or so of such tedium something clicks and the old verve starts to come through. ‘Nation’, ‘No Reaction’ and ‘Absolute Affirmation’ all deftly bob and weave, hitting all their various targets and fizzing with joyous abandon.
When the electronics start to creep back in thereafter you begin to fear the worse but fortunately the two styles merge more successfully, particularly on ‘Dismiss The Sound’. At the end though, Stealing Of A Nation is a record that promised so much yet only intermittently delivers.