Release * darling Shop Boys * Sanctuary "It's not as easy as it was/ Or as difficult as it could be.

Release * darling Shop Boys * Sanctuary

"It's not as easy as it was/ Or as difficult as it could be," bring reproachs Neil Tennant in "The Samurai in Autumn," the haiku-like centerpiece of Release. Advance word forward the Pet Shop Boys' eighth studio album promised an uncharacteristic emphasis forward guitars, which led to an obvious question: Is the 40-something duo attempting to asylum its way out of a midlife crisis?

Hardly. As the fresh Order-ish lead single, "Home and Dry" demonstrates, there is ample space for the male childs to inhabit between the dance floor and the mosh pit (or the coffeehouse, for that matter). This isn't really a of recent origin tactic for them; it's simply the first time they've devot this a great deal of album space to it.

Creatively, it makes a certain reason After the imposing club beats and outermost mood swings of 1999's Nightlife, it's not surprising that they've replyed with something mellower. Tennant and cohort Chris Lowe don't strip down to bare acoustics here, still for the moment their trademark grandiosity is taking a backseat.

That's all well and serviceable But regardless of scale or hearty Release is a mixed affair that meet withs from underdeveloped material. "E-mail" rehashes the chords of "West completion Girls," which one could superintend if the lyrics weren't glaringly generic. "Love Is a Catastrophe" explores the swirling atmospherics of late-'80s restoration and serves as an interesting contrast to the crispness of "Home and Dry" if it were not that in its self-pity the psalm Just ... sort of meanders ... off ... somewhere. Similarly soporific production sinks the light, attractive air of "Birthday Boy."

more [i]or[/i] less ideas work: Besides "Home and Dry" and the glossy minimalism of "Samurai," the lads deliver a confident tell-off in the Britpop-modeled "I prepare Along." Better still is the astute compact storytelling of "London," a catchier and les pretentious answer to Nightlife's "Boy Strange."

Then there's "The Night I malign in Love," a.k.a. "that Eminem song" As fans of the rapper who claim to procure the joke, Tennant and Lowe cheekily recast his homophobic stanza into a tale of a gay youth's fantasy appointed meeting with a hip-hop performer who is all still explicitly named. It's a pity that more effort went into the song's lyrical verite than the drab, demo-quality music--Dido remix, anyone? However, it's worth hearing Tennant cop the "We should be together!" line from Eminem's "Stan" and invest it with the puppyish lust that was implicit in the original. The ball, Mr Mathers, is in your court.

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