It seems that Razorlight have the capacity to truly split music fans everywhere. Fronted by a man who truly does himself no favours whatsoever with the press or his detractors (those Bob Dylan quotes anyone?), you can either have your foot firmly in the Borrell, misunderstood genius camp or the Borrell, smug, talentless twat camp.

For those in the latter, new album, Slipway Fires, is going to do absolutely nothing to help remove those feet from said camp. Indeed, if anything, it's far more likely to see long term fans deserting the band in droves and wondering quite what the hell has happened to their messiah.

Slipway Fires, without wanting to get hung up on hyperbole, is an abomination. The album kicks off with the execrable single, 'Wire To Wire' and proceeds to get worse from there on in. Seriously. I was previously under the impression that the only thing more self-important and smug than 'Wire To Wire' was the video for 'Wire To Wire', but it seems I was wrong. Rather than being a Razorlight album (the other members of the band are barely noticeable under their mighty leader's cat-baiting trill) this is more of an insight into Johnny Borrell's bizarre mind, a kind of "My Musings and Opinions" by JB. Gone are the pop hooks and catchy melodies of 'America', 'Golden Touch' and 'Stumble and Fall', replaced by insipid contemplations on how Borrell is just so much deeper than the rest of us. "These middle class kids are so strange / They get everything for nothing, nothing comes your way" he complains on 'Tabloid Lover', whilst 'North London Trash' (a piss-weak rip-off of Oasis's 'The Importance Of Being Idle') brutally takes apart the trendy London ideology by way of 4th year creative-writing standard poetry.

The thing is, the band has never been heralded for their lyrical prowess, but the one thing they could do was write a tune. Love them or hate them, their chart-bothering tracks got inside your head. Everything here, however, is banal indie drivel at its most unmemorable. 'Hostage Of Love' (plenty more awful lyrics here) borders on aping The Levellers with an injection of bland Emo, whilst '60 Thompson' and 'Stinger' can most charitably be described as dull.

It's an overwhelming cliché to say that the biggest crime a person can commit is being boring, however, it's slightly wide of the mark. With Slipway Fires, Razorlight have managed to commit the even bigger sin of being terminally boring and absolutely shite.