Adam

Novelist Alexander Trocchi's uneasy blend of Beat existentialism and pseudo porn continue to gnaw in this stylish adaptation of his 1954 whodunnit. Ewan McGregor is suitably dour as the sinister drifter while director David Mackenzie proves himself a master of sustained gloom. But it's the sex scenes, progressing from erotic to self-conscious to simply absurd, that continually corrode.

She walks on stage looking pale and enervated, like a ghostly image of heroin chic. Just what have they done to Thea Gilmore? Then two songs in she reveals she's "got the lurgy, big time". It turns out she's been taking nothing stronger than herbal tea to keep the flu at bay.

Adams' career is fast becoming a blizzard of lost possibilities and abandoned trails, with his 'proper' album releases, such as Gold and Rock'n'Roll, punctuated by closet-clearing collections of outtakes like Demolition and now Love Is Hell Pt 1, the first instalment of the album supposedly deemed too much of a downer to be the 'proper' follow-up to Gold.

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Mercury-winner downsizes in style on carefully focussed fourth album