[music] PATRICK WOLF - Lycanthropy (Tomlab)

A small (and shrinking) number of people may remember My Favorite as they were before they mummified themselves in unrelenting sincerity. They were always sincere, only not stiflingly so... anyhow, Patrick Wolf often sounds just like My Favorite singer Michael Grace (I guess Grace's fake English accent wasn't so unrealistic after all) but the bounce in his electronic backing tracks means that, for all the lugubriousness of his gypsy-werewolf persona, when his music brings My Favorite to mind it's the vivacious 7"-single My Favorite who may nevermore be seen again. Sad.

If passion could compensate for everything, this would be my new favorite record, as even when his other (substantial) skills waver, Wolf sings very, very passionately. But something in the vocals -- I honestly couldn't tell you if it's performance, or lyrics and melody -- doesn't hold up to TOO much strain. Unlike with other flawed, young, self-mythologizing one-man bands (Kleenex Girl Wonder/Graham Smith, Cex), I don't find myself disappointed about the emotional relationship that I couldn't quite form with the record on account of its spottiness, and I don't find myself raring to find out what the next step for Wolf is. Even though the evidence suggests it could be good.