Everything But The Girl

Temperamental

Atlantic

They get their name from a sign outside a furniture store: "For all your bedroom needs, everything but the girl." They couldn't have chosen a better name, because that is exactly what one likes about this album, everything but the you-know-who. Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt firs came out in 1982 with a jazz-pop sound, and people kind of liked them then. Now, numerous covers, one big Todd Terry remix club hit ("Missing"), one milestone album (Walking Wounded), several style shifts and too many years later, they hit out with a diffused house album that can't reach the mark. Temperamental is a post-trolling album; it whiffs like vapor. It is typically morose and introspective; you could mistake at first that the disconnection between Thorn's dreary vocals and Watt's creative instrumental mischief is intentional to achieve a wasteland acoustic for Watt's sensitive lyrics. But, no. The only piece that holds up is "Five Fathoms," and that's because it's the first time you hear Thorn. From thereon, Watt's clever intros are continually hijacked by Thorn's living-deadpan delivery. "Compression" is a joy for being jungle-smacked and free of her (except in adulterated form). Temperamental is really Watt's project after the last three years of underground DJ-ing. The girl makes it quickly tiresome. B