Brett Anderson - 'Black Rainbows' (Brett Anderson) Released: 26/09/11

Brett Anderson, by all accounts, has been through a lot. For a man in his early 40s he has already endured a crippling drug addiction, the break up and reconciliation with forming sparring partner Bernard Butler,  and over 20 years in the public eye. With this in mind the recording and release of a fourth solo album, 'Black Rainbows', must seem like a walk in the park for the idiosyncratic 43 year-old.

Brooding album opener 'Unsung', begins seemingly as a slow burner tinged with Anderson’s characteristic melancholy (“those impossible clouds are gathering now”), before the sweeping melody of the chorus transforms it into a ballad of the bleakest nature. The mood recalls 'Now My Heart is Full', the opener from Morrissey’s landmark solo release 'Vauxhall and I'.

'Brittle Heart' demonstrates Anderson’s trademark tortured romanticism and beautifully ambiguous lyrics, as he pleads “give me your brittle heart and your ashtray eyes” but despite this it’s one of 'Black Rainbow'’s more accessible moments and acts as highlight of the record’s first half whilst containing some of the finest lyrics Anderson has written in years: “I’ll make a an effigy from a lock of your hair, and all the cinders and ashes can be ours to share” he pines.

The drive time radio friendly jangle pop of 'Crash About To Happen' follows before 'I Count the Times' and 'The Exiles' sees Anderson write the sort of dark brooding rock anthems that Editors and White Lies could but dream of creating.

Anderson’s gift for wrapping melodies around the most abstruse of lyrics and sparsest musical arrangements is no more evident than on the gorgeous “This Must Be Where It Ends”. Anderson cries out for help to a “mistress” before the track’s epic production builds to a colossal crescendo which is all strings, tortured vocal and grandiose production.

It is perhaps only Actors which fails reach the heights of the rest of the album, with it’s almost “Suede-by-numbers” feel due to the industrial, abrasive guitar backing but struggles under the awkwardness of its patchwork composition.

The shimmering guitar chords of In The House Of Numbers bleeds into penultimate track Thin Men Dancing which recalls mid-period Bowie with its confident swagger and pompous stomp. Perhaps the title is a direct reference to the Thin White Duke, who knows?

Anderson yearns on 'Black Rainbows’ closing track, 'Possession', about the “weakness I feel when I hear her name” and herein lies an indication as to the best way to sum up what is an album defined by its heartbreaking beauty. Beneath it all; the addiction, the high profile fall outs and shape shifting 20 year career, Black Rainbows proves that Anderson is still both a lyricist of uncompromising quality and a hopeless romantic. What’s more he’s all the better for it.