Dirty Pretty Things - 'Waterloo To Anywhere' (Mercury) Released 08/05/06

To have successfully survived the fallout from The Libertines all the while in the shadow of Doherty’s very public Babyshambles is one thing. But to come out on the other side with a functioning band and your dignity still intact is another. Carl Barat and his Dirty Pretty Things deserve more a pat on the back than the usual introductions.

It’s almost unfortunate that their debut album ‘Waterloo To Anywhere’ will have to stand up to so many understandable comparisons before being considered in its own right. However, this is essentially The Libertines third album and you can’t help but regard it as being so. Though this is not a lazy cop out on behalf of the band, more a reinforcement of their skills as both lyricists and musicians. ‘Deadwood’ and ‘Doctors and Dealers’ bombard the eardrums and provide WTA with its scratchy, live, sing-along feel somewhat reminiscent of ‘Up The Bracket’. And lyrics such as “But now I know that you were the coward, The holes in your soul, In tatters for all these years” seem to refer to a certain former Libertine. As does the already infectious debut single ‘Bang Bang You’re Dead’.

Thankfully this is short lived. The rest of the album has a more conscious ‘produced’ feel to it that takes us away from the tense tight opening tracks, but retains the catchy guitars and treats us to Barat’s dark romantic Englishness, or to be more precise, if such a word exists, London-ness. ‘Gentry Cove’ ‘Enemy’ and ‘If You Love a Woman’ tell stories on an honest personal level. And if the first part of WTA conveys a raw urgency, then the second part definitely has a familiar lived in feel to it. That initial raw immediacy lingers however and the listener is dragged kicking, screaming and spitting through the signature song ‘You ****ing Love It’. But the refrain is brief. ‘Wondering’, ‘Last of the Small Town Playboys’ and ‘B.U.R.M.A’ are again personal journeys through the psyche of Carl Barat and like the rest of WTA are punctuated with catchy riffs, persistent drums and bass and end the album on a slightly twisted optimistic note.

“So when the dark times come I’ll sing you a good time song, I’m pretending that its ending but it kills me to act so strong, To gaze into your eyes makes all the difference to me.”

Despite weighing in at a disappointing 37 minutes, WTA is a highly personal album for DPT. It’s raw, urgent, engaging, loud, intimate, English and uncompromising. And the more you listen to it you realise it sounds more like Carl Barat and less like The Libertines. Hopefully you’ll ****ing love it.