Teenagers: if you came here looking for your fix of vitriolic angst, look away now. Placebo's fifth studio album may have that inherent infuriation that fans would call essential and cynics would call expedient, but it's been bottled, matured and filtered into something more cohesive this time round. Brian Molko, approaching his mid-30s, has settled down and become a father, and though his lyrics are still abjectly caustic at times ('You are one of God's mistakes/You crying, tragic waste of skin'), vocally and musically his warped sting has been somewhat diminished. Lyrically, Meds has an underlying, often ambigious theme of rejection, troubled relationships and isolation; similar to any other Placebo album, then. Producer Dimitri Tokovoi has brought the trio back to basics after the experimentation of 2004's Sleeping With Ghosts, and by all means it's done them the world of good. Drag, One Of A Kind and Cold Light of Morning are classic Placebo; heavy verses and gnarled, anthemic choruses. They have left some room for experimentation though; but duets - with VV from The Kills on lacklustre opener Meds, and Michael Stipe on the subdued Broken Promise - are disappointingly weak. Unexpectedly, there are hints of Depeche Mode on several tracks (the brilliant Infra-Red, the swaggering Blind), use of sinister piano that harks back to earlier material again (A Song To Say Goodbye) and even several sensitive ballads (Pierrot the Clown, Follow The Cops Back Home).What may be Placebo's last album is a definite grower, if ultimately lacking in innovation. Meds is perhaps a suitable title, then; one dose won't do anything for you, but stay the course and you may just reap the benefits.
