'Broadcast' begins where 'Souls' ends

Doves
The Last Broadcast
Capitol Records The Doves busted out of Britain in 2000 with their debut, Lost Souls, and were proclaimed one in a line of bands touted as the next Radiohead. Lost Souls was a sprawling 72-minute epic work of pop, rock and ambient soundscapes. It was good. It was long, and it was somewhat musically scattered. Nonetheless, Lost Souls garnered much praise on both sides of the Atlantic, and it is safe to assume that their follow-up has been widely anticipated. The Last Broadcast begins where its predecessor left off with nearly a minute and a half of chilly ambience. What follows is a spring cleaning of the Doves' catalog. Some of the dust is cleared from its compositions, leaving less of the hazy ambience that was Lost Souls and more of the straightforward pop-rock experience -- albeit in an ambient, eccentric, Manchester-esque sort of way. The genre-hopping still remains. See the groovy, Stone Roses-like pop of "Words," the space rock of "N.Y.," or the near seven-minute epic "Satellite," with its understated "We Will Rock You" stomp and handclap rhythms and gospel choir-sounding chorus. With The Last Broadcast, the Doves have cleaned up nicely and, as a result, the band might gain a somewhat wider audience. Plus, in cutting about 20 minutes off the record running time, one can actually enjoy the whole thing completely without missing appointments or falling asleep. As for the next Radiohead tag, chalk it up to an eager press looking to hype anything that moves and has even the slightest bit of mystique. The Doves do not create Radiohead records, despite comparable surface eccentricities and a penchant for the less-than-traditional. The Doves have created, with The Last Broadcast, a record worthy of second and third listens and a record that is enjoyable in its ambition and scope. For that, the Doves don't need to be Radiohead.