Album: Delta

Hard Light, Dell'Orso

Like so many lower-league Britpop outfits, Birmingham's Delta have been buffeted over the years by the vagaries of public taste and record-company vacillations. Yet they've struggled on to record, with this third album, their definitive statement – 10 tracks that may comprise the last great Britpop release. The album leaves both Heathen Chemistry and A Rush Of Blood To The Head floundering in its wake – not least in the subtlety and aptness of the Beatles influence behind a song like "Funny Looking Angels", whose harmonies have the congenial melodic quality of the Fabs' best work. The opening song, "Nothing Happened", could well be autobiographical, with its plaintive hook "Revolution turning round/ Nothing happened, nothing happened" reflecting Delta's unsteady progress on the roundabout of fame. But it's more notable for the way in which keyboardist Louis J Clark's orchestral arrangements here and throughout the album add a piquant depth akin to Love's Forever Changes. Scott Walker is another obvious touchstone on tracks such as the brooding "Wheel Of Light" and the grandiose ballad "Happy Birthday Nik Nak", where the strings dash up and down the scale like dervishes. Though at times they slip into more turgid territory, as in the stompy "Head On" and "Survive", overall Hard Light is as engaging a mainstream Brit-band album as you'll hear all year.