Anita Lane

Upon first glance, this looks to be a potentially cheeky mainstream album, but Sex O'Clock is actually a respectably good package of slick, sultry pop by Anita Lane, who happens to be one of the cofounders of Nick Cave's Bad Seeds band. Additional Bad Seed Mick Harvey is heavily involved as well, producing and co-writing much of the material here. French pop maestro Bertrand Burgalat chips in too, recording some of the strings and vocals. Lane has previously worked with hipsters such as Einstürzende Neubauten and Barry Adamson on a Serge Gainsbourg series, giving her even more cred. This album is slickly produced and makes for some nice, naughty fun. Sex is indeed one of the prime topics, especially on tracks such as "The Next Man That I See" and "Do The Kamasutra." There are lots of nice, big arrangements with brass and strings, and the end result is somewhere in between Saint Etienne's sugary pop and the darker, moody cabaret music that permeates through artists like Burgalat himself, or Black Box Recorder. With a nice line-up of talent and a good breadth of song styles, Sex O'Clock is full of cool, slinky music.