The Fratellis - 'Mistress Mabel'
Y'know, for a second there I thought someone had come in and replaced my taste glands in the night. I even had to go and check the bed to look for evidence, just to be sure that some gland fairy hadn't popped up by the alarm clock, got confused cos my head was under the pillow (don't ask - a nightmare about being eaten by a giant marshmallow), whipped out my critical faculties, stuck a pound coin up my nose and flew off into the darkness, giggling wetly.
I've checked though, and there's nothing amiss. And that coin has either fallen out or gone further in. Which means the problem lies not with me, but with the Fratellis.
There's just something about this song which is...off. It would fit perfectly well within the band's last album, a record which has been played a lot in my house, and which contains many hair-raising suckerpunch terrace-rock anthems in the vein of Slade and T.Rex. Jon Fratelli's ear for a pop hook is as acute as ever and the lyrics are your typical guttersnipe nonsense about loose women with archaic names who seduce young men (especially young men with a top hat resting on their curly locks).
But something hasn't quite made the transition from album one to album two. I did originally think it was just over-familiarity with what the band does, and a feeling that this is just another spin on 'Chelsea Dagger' or 'Henrietta', and therefore not really worth getting excited about. But it's not just that,
If you look on YouTube at the moment there are a few leaked versions of new Fratellis songs out there, and at least one of them - - does exactly what this song should do. It arrives in heavy boots, kicks up some dust, drinks all your dad's booze, scares the cat, then headbutts the door down, tips a wink to the lady of the house and stomps off into the night, in seach of a bit of bother, with only the scuff-marks on the walls as proof it was ever there.
In contrast, 'Mistress Mabel' trips on the front door step before it even arrives, and is easily repelled with a stout shove. It's too serious, too earnest, it lumbers where it should shimmy and it replaces the band's camp swagger with a steroid-enhanced plod. The Fratellis are a party band, they are glam-cavemen, neanderthals in lipgloss, they're above this kind of gravy-flavoured drabness, and frankly, so am I.
I found that pound coin in the end. It seems it wasn't the gland fairy after all. But if you see a shiny midget with wings dragging what looks like an adult male spleen with her, could you ask her to maybe give me a call? Thanks ever so!
Download: Out now
CD Released: May 26th
(Fraser McAlpine)
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