A GUY CALLED GERALD
28 Gun Bad Boy
JUICEBOX

A third LP for Gerald, one of the original Brit techno pack now releasing records on his own label without much concern for the current clubland vogue. So rather than reinvent himself as a modish, intelligent techno type he's stuck with the breakbeat jungle stuff that's now almost exclusively the preserve of pirate radio.

As hardcore goes, this continuously-mixed selection isn't bad, it's not ridiculously fast, there are no tiresome toytown samples, and the best bits come on like a rewed-up version of 808 State gone rave. But the genre itself has pretty much run out of steam and if A Guy Like Gerald, who has a load more talent than your average bedroom-based sample-freak, can't make it sound relevant then its days are surely numbered.

2 out of 5

[Reviewer: RUPERT HOWE]