Robbie Williams, Rudebox (EMI) *** [review]

'By Dave Stanford

TEN years down the line into his solo career, and Robbie Williams has finally produced his Marmite moment, an album fans will love or hate. Gone is the super-slick, cheeky-chappy, pop phenomenon, radically overhauled and replaced by an electro-funk, electro-pop-laden rapping Robbie, expletives aplenty.
Does it work? Sometimes yes, and sometimes no.
Tracks such as The 80s and The 90s - autobiographical raps covering his teenage and Take That years - sum it up perfectly. It's Robbie-does-The Streets in a Staffordshire accent. It should be terrible. But it's highly amusing and not as bad as you think.
There are several eclectic covers: Lewis Taylor's unknown soul anthem Lovelight is turned into a euphoric disco tune, Stephen Duffy's 80s classic Kiss Me is reinvented (for the better), and we have the bizarre situation of a cover-of-a-cover with My Robot Friend's We Are The Pet Shop Boys.
His efforts at "wonky pop" are less successful. The single and album opener Rudebox, with its slack-rap delivery and thumping bass, is embarrassingly bad. Like a dancing dad at a wedding, it's Robbie trying too hard to be hip, while Bongo Bong And Je Ne T'Aime Plus, featuring Lilly Allen, is too bonkers for its own good.
The ballads and sugar-coated pop have, mercifully, been left at the door, replaced by something fresh, fun and frantic. Sometimes he hits the bull's-eye, sometimes he shoots himself in the foot, but at least Robbie is taking risks.
Robbie might be hunting credibility but The Ordinary Boys are seemingly chasing celebrity. ... '