Ian Brown
Dolphins Were Monkeys (Polydor)
Another half-decent Brown offering, kicking in with the same sort of fuzzy, funky electric keyboard riff that so splendidly drove 'Love Like A Fountain'. There's some bongo fury going on down there as well but the riotous, 24-hour party effect is somehow kept in check by the pinched surliness of the vocal delivery. Once again, he sounds properly Browned off.
Lyrically, Brown makes an alternative claim for dolphins in the evolutionary scale. They are indeed supposed to be the next most intelligent species after man but they haven't always demonstrated this. Given their fat-headed, occasional tendency to lose their way out at sea and ending up floundering midway up the Thames and dying of water poisoning, as well as their dimwitted incapability of evading perfectly visible tuna nets, they've a while to go before they can shed their stigma of Dunces Of The Deep.
The B-side here is Brown's intriguing, if slightly moribund version of Michael Jackson's 'Billie Jean', more broody and shifty than out and out pop-funky. He wisely resists emulating Jacko's crotch-grabbing yelps and squeals but the "I didn't do it!" theme of the song is one with which he's well familiar.
David Stubbs
10
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