Quench

10 Oct 1998

Courtesy of B. Gross

While most bands can be categorised as cheese 'n' onion, the Beautiful South represent a sweet-on-the-outside, sour underneath, chocolate pretzel anomaly in pop music's snack supermarket. That is, it's easier to say what they're not - cool, sexy or fashionable - than what they are.

Despite being hugely successful, their hits compilation, Carry on Up the Charts, sold a staggering 2.5 million copies in Britain, the Beautiful South remain under-rated by the politburos of taste. Their easy-listening melodies and piano-led arrangements present a problem to anyone who buys records to torment their parents.

The Beautiful South have been described as an "acid bomb dropped in enemy MOR territory," but there's little to pogo to during Quench, their sixth studio album, and by far their best. There is, however, more than enough evidence to ensure their name is added to a list of superior British songwriting, which includes the Kinks and Madness, with whom they share a quirkiness that masks their obvious intelligence.

The tracks Dumb and Pockets both feature sublimely pleasing arrangements, while The Slide uses strings and a gospel choir but doesn't go overboard, using them with glorious style. It is, simply, their finest moment. Norman Cook - better known these days as Fatboy Slim - used to be in the Housemartins with several members of the South, and he guests intermittently, providing squelches, squeaks and loops that add further tasty morsels to the sonic soup.

Lyrically there are, as always, some great one-liners, courtesy of co-writers Paul Heaton and David Rotheray who, more often than not, use the demon drink as a syphon for their humour. Some of the best are to be found during I May Be Ugly, where Heaton tells the story of a man "with a chin like a tramp's shoe-box/And eyes like a rhino's ashtray," who "feels like London but looks like Hull." Then there's Perfect 10, their sixteenth hit single, which manages to be both funny and touching at the same time.

For those who don't look beyond the surface, Dave Hemingway and Jacqueline Abbott, who complete the triumverate of vocalists with Heaton, supply some typical Radio 2 pleasers, albeit of the "MOR acid bomb" variety. But above all, this is Heaton's album. He sings many of the songs with his customary range, from gruff to soulful, and this, combined with his co-production role on the album, results in a substantial and eccentric record.

Anyone who still thinks the Beautiful South are purveyors of all things nice should stick around for the closing track, Your Father and I, in which Heaton and Abbott swap vocals in the style of The Pogues' Fairytale Of New York to tell a child about its birth. In Heaton's mind the baby was conceived "in a one-star hotel, with five-star love," while for Abbott it was merely "a one star drunken screw". Where others would take a whole novel, the Beautiful South tell a story in one song. And there's nothing cheesy about it.