Eoin Butler's guide to singles, downloads and free audiostreams

GNARLS BARKLEY
Going On Downtown
Atlantic
***
There are shades of Ennio Morricone in Danger Mouse's production, but Cee-Loo's lyrics remain as baffling as ever. Exhibit A: "Anyone who needs what they want/But doesn't want what they need/I want nothing to do with." Cancel my two o'clock, Susan. I'm figuring this out if it takes all day.

MYSTERY JETS
Two Doors Down
679 Recordings
**
Irony is all very well. But when one of your songs could fit seamlessly onto a Little Jimmy Osmond compilation without remark, it's time to start asking yourself the hard questions, buddy.

THE COURTEENERS
No You Didn't, No You Don't
Polydor
**
"The new Manc messiahs?" wondered the NME. Not by the sounds of this track they're not. I mean, didn't the just-because-I- nicked-your-hubcaps-doesn't- mean-I-don't-read-books-occasionally lad rock template become boring about 10 years ago?

UGLY MEGAN
The Gavin, Megan and Oisin EP
Well Wicked Wecords
***
Kooky teenage girl/boy duo from Waterford who wear their Moldy Peaches fandom - like their DayGlo bracelets - on their sleeves.

DAN Le SAC vs SCROOBIUS PIP
Letter from God to Man
Sunday Best Recordings
*
Combines the hard-hitting political analysis of a sixth class religion project with the breathtaking profundity of a chain e-mail FW: from your deranged Aunt Betty. Oh, and there's a Radiohead sample in there too. I'm all for juvenile, but this is nauseatingly adolescent.

LAURA MARLING
Cross Your Fingers/Crawled Out of the Sea
Virgin
*** *
Were Marling not hip, south London anti-folk royalty and all that, I'd be tempted to say that she sounds a lot like our very own Mary Black. The 60-second coda of Crawled Out of the Sea, however, is undeniably beautiful.

DEF LEPPARD
C'mon C'mon
Universal
*
C'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon . . . It does appear that Joe Elliot and the boys have let that famously stringent quality control of theirs slip somewhat in recent years.