Yours Truly, Angry Mob

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It's perhaps not surprising that the band is unable to keep their Employment energy level intact, but Mob's level of cynicism seems a bit of an overcompensation, as if the second record is an extended dreary hangover from the drunken escapade of the first. Wilson's preoccupation with failed (and failing) romantic relationships continues with "Love Is Not a Competition (But I'm Winning)" as the logical followup to Employment's "Everyday I Love You Less and Less", the sentiment from which was properly identified on this Web site in Joe Tangari's Employment review as barely concealed pining. In Japan, "Boxing Champ" and "Everything Is Average Nowadays" were added together to make one track, at a running time of 4:15.

stars out of 5 -- "[T]heir second album manages to be full of surprises, while never straying too far from what you'd expect. Wilson attempts to force a barroom competitor into independent thought: "You're winding yourself up until you're turning blue, repeating everything that you've read," before giving up: "It's only 'cause you came here with your brothers, too; if you came here on your own you'd be dead. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album has received an average score of 61, based on 29 reviews. The band consists of Ricky Wilson (vocals), Andrew "Whitey" White (guitar), Simon Rix (bass), Nick "Peanut" Baines (keyboards) and Vijay Mistry(drums).

The band, in love as ever with the Britpop tradition that spawned them, offers another collection of swaggering uptempo guitar tracks that are full of big, singalong choruses. He accidentally explains it best in "Thank You Very Much" (itself a pale retread of "I Predict a Riot"'s rhythm bed): "This should be a thrill, but it feels like a drill.

With a bit of distance, Employment certainly sounds like a debut record from a band rushed into the spotlight. Additionally, in July 2006 the band revealed to Gigwise that they hoped to have the album released by Valentine's Day 2007. Some user-contributed text on this page is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. Of course, he doesn't, which was fine when the band was content to wallop the listener over the head.

If "Mob" ended with that bit of resignation, it would be fine, but the coda brings the groans, explaining the titular mass not as rowdy bar patrons or concert attendees, but society itself: "We are the angry mob, we read the papers everyday/ We like who we like, we hate who we hate, but we're oh so easily swayed. stars out of 5 -- "[The album] marches through its baker's dozen of punk-tinged pop songs with a prickly sense of purpose. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and the band released the singles "Everything Is Average Nowadays" on 21 May 2007 and "The Angry Mob" on 20 August 2007.