Happy Mondays
Unkle Dysfunktional
Shock 2007

Unkle is the Mondays first album since the early 90s, and most importantly for them, their first since 24 Hour Party People came out. It sees them pick up where they left off - cleaner, more sober - apparently. The tunes havent really changed - but everyone else has. They can roll back into the picture, with their funk cum hiphop-house, and still be relevant. Shaun Ryders last major appearance was on the Gorillaz track Dare, and much of Unkle is a sonic synergy to that work. Instrumentally, the tracks could easily be by New Young Pony Club or Bumblebeez or MIA or some other hip cat. Ryder, however, is the difference. His vocal presence takes the tracks up a level, or two or three. His rapping / rhyming / screaming / whatever is as inventive as it is entertaining. Tracks that should for all attemps fail - the entire lyrical structure for Cuntrydisco could be summed up in the equation Ive been [n] on your bed room window where n= a mildly amusing verb - and would fail if Ryder was a lesser man. But he is Ryder, and Ryder, for all his flaws, really is a great mercenary of the English language.