Comfort in Sound [CD + DVD]

"Just the Way I'm Feeling" is classic Feeder (think "Day In Day Out" meets "Undivided", with strings) and has a naked vocal that characterises (and exemplifies) the whole album. "Summer's Gone" plays Muse at their own game (and wins), whereas "Find the Colour" is shameless, glorious pop and a welcome beam of feel-good optimism after the album's stand-out track "Quick Fade"--a heart-wrenching love letter to a much missed friend. The melancholy is inescapable however, because "the love pollution's setting in" ("Love Pollution"--perhaps Nicholas's most perfectly realised song). Only the pointless noise of "Godzilla" blemishes an otherwise perfect record. Mature, sophisticated and epic, Nicholas's design for life has made him one of the most gifted songwriters in Britain today. This is awesome, but devastating. --Ben Johncock