Neon Neon are Gruff Rhys from Super Furry Animals and the Los Angeles-based producer Boom Bip. Stainless Style is a concept album based on John DeLorean, creator of the iconic DMC-12 sports car - as featured in Back to the Future - or, if you prefer, a man who milked £85m of our taxes to subsidise a car that barely scraped into production before Margaret Thatcher exclaimed “What f***wit authorised this?” (possibly), then scrapped it. Well, if you’re going to make a concept album, you need a story with legs - or, in this case, gull wings. Rhys and Bip are at their best when they pastiche 1980s synth pop (Trick for Treat and the hit-in-waiting I Lust You) or when they simply give free rein to Rhys’s melodic sense (Steel Your Girl). The guest rappers, however, seem a bit bolted-on.

Lex LEX067CD

Radiohead make Mercury shortlist

Radiohead competes with The Last Shadow Puppets, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss and Estelle for the prestigious prize

BACKGROUND

• Neon Neon: Stainless Style

• Neon Neon shine bright in Texas

• Super Furry Animals: Hey Venus!

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