Beck: Guero

Herald rating: * * *

It's meant to be Beck to basics - a return to beatbox and blues twang for the guy whose every album since his commercial peak of Odelay has come with a giant swerve. And coming off the heartbreak confessional of Sea Change, which followed the funk freak-out of Midnite Vultures, initially Guero can sound like trademark Beck of a decade ago - the lo-fi slacker Loser-genius musical magpie.

But get over the stylistic familiarity that comes from his reunion with Odelay era producers the Dust Brothers, and there is many a track that rises above the sonic retrofit. And his lyrics make a lot more sense that they once did too - his apparent dabble in Scientology might have clarified a few things, perhaps.

And while it comes with few too many throwaways - such as Go It Alone with Jack White on bass, the Devil's Haircut remake that is E-Pro among them - there's plenty of smart, strange evocative songs. Among them Que Onda Guero is the condensed sound of of an LA neighbourhood you don't often get to visit in pop.

Girl's New Wave pop is an infectious as Outkast's Hey Ya!, Missing entrances with its plaintive vocal and Latin shuffle, and Rental Car neatly tailgates 60s pyschedelia with handclap funk.

But Guero doesn't grip as Beck's earlier offerings always managed. It's not like he's lost inspiration here, just the capacity to surprise.

Label: Interscope