Kill Your Darlings

Four years after his debut, an full-length of clever, double-entendre trip-hop, Kid Loco plunged deeper into the world of knowing naïveté with Kill Your Darlings. If the explicit liners aren't enough eye-candy for all the nymphomaniacs out there, the French downtempo producer and pop fanatic kicks off with a track named "Cocaine Diana" and the languorous female vocal: "Once the devil came into my kitchen/and with a knife and a fork, he ate my chicken/Twice the Lord came into my bedroom/and drunk boozy booze to gimme real satisfaction" over a slinky bassline and a few orchestral tune-up blattings. Tim Keegan, an occasional guitarist with Robyn Hitchcock and the leader of Departure Lounge, also makes appearances on several songs, though his sly, faux-emotional delivery on "Three Feet High Reefer" and "A Little Bit of Soul" tends to grate. The female vocalist, Louise Quinn, is less annoying, but also plays the coquette far too much. At times, Kill Your Darlings is a dead ringer for the anthemic meanderings of Mazzy Star's Hope Sandoval and the Jesus & Mary Chain on the latter's Stoned and Dethroned album. Dragged down to the level of material like "Here Come the Munchies" (surely one of the most inane lyrics of the year), Kid Loco can't possibly hope to rescue these songs, no matter how good his productions. - All Music Guide