Supergrass: Supergrass Is 10

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

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Supergrass always seemed a little shorter than their British peers but they were frequently smarter and always funnier. Even Steven Spielberg thought so. He apparently wanted to turn them into the new Monkees.

Unlike their compatriots, they stole from all over, compressing entire dusty record collections into some songs. And while they were hardly short of hooks, they also possessed Britpop's best basslines: the likes of Moving and Sun Hits the Sky showed bassist Mick Quinn to be the Paul McCartney of Britpop.

The emphasis here is on the good old days of firecracker debut album I Should Coco, which takes up nearly a third of the 21 tracks, despite their 1997 second album In It For the Money being their true classic, while subsequent albums have been decidedly patchy. Hence the reason for this collection.

Still, whether it's the combined sugar and fuzzpop rush of Caught By the Fuzz, the Bowie-meets-Bay City Rollers glam of Pumping On the Stereo, the reflective anthems of Late In the Day or the great psychedelic pop swirl of Going Out, this compilation shows Supergrass were always a great singles band, even if it was sometimes hard to know just how seriously to take them.

That's still the case. On Kiss of Life, one of two new tracks on offer, they've decided they can sound like mid-period Talking Heads too, the clever wee monkeys.