This massive workload may have taken its toll on his social skills, for Homme also found time to fire long-term accomplice and fellow QOTSA constant Nick Oliveri. These two had always been the Bert and Ernie of heavy metal, as inseparable and in-tune with each other as a newly married couple according to most interviews, and it has to be said that Oliveri’s presence is missed on this record – but more of that later.

Things start finely, if predictably, enough, with Mark Lanegan once again dropping by to lend his magnificently-weathered lungs to opener ‘This Lullaby’ (sadly the only song he sings lead on this time around). It’s a creepy acoustic, well, lullaby, which sets the tone nicely for this exceptionally dark album. It is immediately followed by the stunningly fast and furious ‘Medication’ and the similar ‘Everybody Knows That You Are Insane’ – think Black Sabbath playing the Ramones. So far so good. Things get distinctly poppy with the MTV friendly ‘In My Head’ (an only slightly different version of which was also featured, cheekily enough, on last year’s Desert Sessions) and ‘Little Sister’, which sounds like boogie-rock for the boogie-man.

The second half of the album is more difficult. It’s pretty clear that Homme intended to make this the darkest, spookiest, dirtiest album he possibly could, all wolves and dark woods and witches; music to give you nightmares. Sadly his vision has translated into several droning songs that simply go on too long with not much happening in them. On ‘Someone’s in the Wolf’, the album’s most Brothers Grimm moment, Homme croons “So glad you could stay forever...” over and over again, to the point that the skip track button seems very appealing. Final track ‘Long Slow Goodbye’ is a late welcome return to form, but not enough to save the overall product. True, Songs for the Deaf was repetitive at times but it worked, largely because of the juxtaposition (sorry, that’s a word that’s best never used outside of English Lit essays) of Homme’s sometimes long-winded metal with Oliveri’s punk explosions; ‘Six Shooter’ style musical flailings are sadly absent from this album.

But it’s not just a Nick Oliveri-shaped hole that weakens this album – Homme simply isn’t at his best here. A determinedly enigmatic figure, here he’s just too wrapped up in the mystery of it all: there’s no feeling beneath the music. QOTSA have never been the most intellectually stimulating band, but things are particularly bad this time around: lines such as “Once you’re lost in twilights blue / you don’t find your way, the way finds you” sound cool but just don’t mean anything. Of course, music doesn’t have to be clever to be good (just look at QOTSA’s own Rated R, a dumb party of an album if ever there was one); and no one could deny that musically this album is excellent, if uninventive, crammed as it is with stormy guitars and stomping drumbeats. But you get the impression that Homme thinks he is being clever here, when in fact the deliberate mysteriousness of his lyrics will only alienate most listeners. The end result is a cold and impersonal album – even the production on the vocals at times makes them sound as if they’re being sung from behind a closed door.

Having said all of this, ‘Lullabies To Paralyze’ is not a bad album – Josh Homme is an extremely talented songwriter whose worst work is significantly better than many other’s best – it’s just that the music leaves you with a distinctly empty feeling, like he’s capable of so much more. If all you want are some truly rocking tunes loud and fast enough to scare the neighbours, look no further. But if you like your music to carry some meaning, some passion, this is not the album for you.

Mathew West lives in Edinburgh, which he considers to be a vast improvement over Stonehaven where he was brought up (if you don’t know where Stonehaven is, don’t try to find out. Some things are best left alone). When he’s not throwing money away on cds, complaining, entertaining private Marxist fantasies, or watching TV, he occasionally gets around to studying for a degree in History and Sociology. Once he has his degree he has no idea what he’s going to do with it.

© 2005 Laura Hird All rights reserved.