CD, Limited Edition
Mantra Recordings (2002) UK
If her 1999 debut album reflected the post-folk, torch-singing side of ex-One Dove vocalist Dot Allison's character, so this sophomore effort, We Are Science, demonstrates quite a different facet, with much of the album taking its cue from eighties pretenders Fischerspooner or the avante electrosonics of Adult. The songs are still here of course, with the dirge-like title track and repetitively voxed "I Think I Love You" countered by the stirring "Strung Out" and aching "Lover," both of which feature Mercury Rev's Grasshopper, but where the first album married odd collaborators with an expansive cast of musicians, this second is a much more low-key affair, with Allison and Lone Swordsman Keith Tenniswood's production less acid-house than quiet-night-in-the-living room material. - Kingsley Marshall