Fellow Hoodlums

On their third album of new studio material, Ricky Ross and Deacon Blue continued to pursue their pop/folk/soul hybrid, a musical mixture seemingly unique to the lesser dominions of the British Isles. It's a sound in which the rhythm section usually is aping the Motown house band or The MG's, there are such acoustic instruments as guitars and fiddles (or keyboard on string settings) filling the middle section, and the tunes are topped by an expressive singer with lyrics full of yearning and local references. It doesn't always travel well, and, indeed, although Fellow Hoodlums entered the British charts near the top and produced three chart singles, the album was lost entirely in the U.S. ~ William Ruhlmann