Gorillaz - Plastic Beach

Plastic Beach is the third album from Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett's animated pop group, and will probably receive the most mixed reception. Unlike their previous outings, Plastic Beach has a unified theme of disposability and plasticity, with a good dose of melancholy thrown in. It's like listening to a concept album, which is a quaint notion in the age of digital downloads. However, this sonic unity is also its weakness: compared with the variety of its predecessors, the album is electropop track after electropop track.

Furthermore, unlike Gorillaz and Demon Days, there is no immediate knock-down single like‘Clint Eastwood', ‘19-2000', ‘Feel Good Inc.' or ‘Dare' that leaps out and says "hey listener, notice me!" That's not to say there is nothing good here:‘Sweepstakes' with Mos Def, ‘Some Kind of Nature' with Lou Reed, ‘Melancholy Hill', and the title track featuring the Clash's Paul Simonon and Mick Jones are incredibly enjoyable, catchy even, but still lack the "wow" factor that enlivened the previous albums.

A lot of it comes down to Albarn's production: he simply lacks the skill nor musical intelligence of previous Gorillaz collaborators Dan the Automator and Danger Mouse. Lyrically and musically Albarn is as amazing as ever, but as a producer he has taken a more simplistic approach and Plastic Beach suffers for it. It's enjoyable but – in keeping with the disposable theme – I know I'm not going to remember it by the end of the year when it comes to compiling my "best of 2010" lists.

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