Loveboat

Electro folk heroes don't come any more vivid than Erasure. In their fifteen-year history they have been a hundred dazzling things to a million people. They have been an ideal soundclash of the ethereal and the microchipped; for the soft-hearted they have been a perfectly turned amorous couplet; they've been caretakers of the nation's most succulent synth museum; a statement of flamboyance pride; a diamond mine of statistics; a pair of rude rhinestone cowboy chaps; pop genius sweethearts in anybody's language. Now, in an era of out-the-closet pop, Clarke and Bell have returned to remind the world of the quality of their craftsmanship and show off some rougher edges.