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Hey Stoopid

Andy Stout

Twenty one albums down the trail of the cartoon macabre and for a handful of tracks on 'Hey Stoopid', Alice might as well be talking to himself. Having reinvented himself all over again on 'Trash', this is a consolidating exercise. Dig in, and dig deep, otherwise the bastards'll drag you down to a has-been again.

'Stoopid' works in places, and with the likes of Slash, Vai and Satriani on guitar, and Peter Collins (Rush, Queensryche) producing, it's surprising that it stumbles in others at all. Still, trip it does magnificently on such as 'Love's A Loaded Gun' and two mawkish ballads, eloquently balanced one on each side. But the up side is as up as Alice will ever be. Solid rock with it's entrails dragging in the gutter and horror FX courtesy of Disney, like the creaking atmosphere and sense of epic 'Might As Well Be On Mars'.

Thee are a few vicious little rockers dotted about the place, but the prize offering on Alice's alter this time round is 'Feed My Frankenstein', with Alice croaking "Lick my libido!" as the song raucously slurps along. What more can you say? Alice Mk II isn't giving up yet.

6.7 out of 10