Daveportivo's Cultural Evaluation Facility

Momentum is a precious commodity, in 2008 Lostprophets were so hot that the mere prospect of a new album was enough to catapult them to a headline slot at Download festival. After 2006's Liberation Transmission the Lostprophets were on top of the world, they had their first number one album and in Rooftops and A Town Called Hypocrisy they had created their two biggest mainstream cross over singles to date, the world was at their feet. However things went downhill rapidly, the follow up album that should have secured their spot among's rock's elite failed to materialize. They headlined Download with the same old material and as another two years passed by the white hot hype that had surrounded Lostprophets had cooled. As a result the once eagerly anticipated The Betrayed announced itself with more of a whimper than a bang. The new fans gained on Liberation Transmission had faded away and the core audience had become disaffected with their poppier sentiments and the seemingly eternal delays. So why did The Betrayed take so long to arrive? Well the Lostprophets had the small matter of marriage and fatherhood to attend to. But now that they're back the question remains can the Lostprophets claw their way back to the top? Is The Betrayed relevant in 2010 or has the music world passed them by in their lengthy lay off?

The Betrayed fails to offer any firm answers in either direction. It becomes immediately apparent that Ian Watkins hasn't lost his touch for writing incredibly catchy and urgent sounding pop songs. Yet there is nothing on The Betrayed that has the breakout potential of Rooftops but that being said there's hardly a track that can't be described as infectious. Starting out on fire, the lyrically laughable but surprisingly touching If It Wasn't For Hate We'd Be Dead By Now feels like a decoy. With it's big booming drum arrangement and slow paced opening it gives the impression that the Lostprophets might be intent on expanding their sound, opting for a more considered approach. Lyrically it's cringe inducing but it's the kind of sloganeering that angst ridden teens will eat up, they certainly know their target demographic. Dstyr and Dstyr then bursts onto the scene, feeling immediately familiar, it incredibly dated but the slick bombast of the bass and one of Watkins' urgent hooks make it an early highlight. While it offers little interest or intrigue it's a perfect slice of mosh along pop that will tear festival fields to shreds come the summer. From then on in it feels like we're been teleported by to 2006 with a hybrid sound stuck somewhere between Liberation Transmission and Start Something. Lead single It's Not The End Of The World is a suitably generic affair, another cookie cutter LP track that doesn't have a forward thinking bone in it's body, this doesn't stop it from being a remarkably infectious fare. It's followed up by Where We Belong, another by the numbers single, this is about as close as Lostprophets come to a ballad with a tired and sentimental chorus. Despite feeling like your stuck in a time machine the bulk of The Betrayed is carried by these fast furious and damn catchy four minute pop jaunts; AC Ricochet, For He's A Jolly Good Felon and Streets Of Nowhere are all infinitely hummable affairs.

Despite an undoubted fun factor to Lostprophets work it's matched equally by a palpable cringe factor. While Watkins lyrics are certainly designed to stick in your head rather than provoke your thoughts you can't help but feel insulted by sloppy thoughtless fare like the chorus of juevenile pap Next Stop Afro City; "Get In The Car, Get In The Car, Keep Running But You Won't Get Far, We Got Velocity, We Wanna Be Atrocity". You can certainly imagine swathes of teenagers thinking this is the coolest thing they've ever heard, but nevertheless it's mind numbingly morose. Thankfully the guitars are so jagged and bouncy that you spend as much time head banging as you do rolling your eyes. The Lostprophets work their arses of to cram as much bombast and as many hooks as humanly possible into each track, and for this reason that The Betrayed manages to succeed on it's own terms. It's a shame that they haven't often much substance to match their cheap thrills, after all you'd have hoped that fatherhood and marriage might have given them some weighty inspiration. Instead we seem to find a band in denial, living in the past both lyrically and sonically; still throwing out empty slogans to tug at the heartstrings of Kerrang readers ("I've Got The Rope To Hang Your Jesus Even Higher") and persisting with a largely unaltered sound that would have started to sound tired in 2008 but sounds positively ancient in 2010.

So The Betrayed offers few answers to the vital questions being posed of the Lostprophets. The Betrayed is an album that does just enough to get by, it's a welcome comeback, crammed full of addictive throwaway pop songs that will sound fantastic live. While It's unlikely to rekindle the fire of 2006 it will certainly satisfy all those who decide to take the plunge with plenty of bang for your buck. However The Betrayed does nothing more than satisfy, it does the bare minimum, it's an enjoyably listen, but not a memorable one. It's not a classic by any stretch of the imagination, it's not daring, intriguing or a giant leap forward for a much loved band. It's the sound of a band playing it safe and living in the past. The Betrayed won't stand out in the crowd, it won't have people coming back again and again, and in ten years time not even Kerrang will be listing this as a classic. Lostprophets have decided to start a new decade by showing that they are still firmly rooted in the last, but as long as Ian Watkins can continue to write such undeniably catchy pop record then they will get another chance. Most importantly The Betrayed will serve as a stop gap, a passable album that they almost had to produce. After letting expectation and superstardom pass them by the release of The Betrayed seems like a band getting a monkey off their backs, finally releasing an album that has lingered over them for far too long. It will remind the world why they liked the Lostprophets in the first place, but if their next offering isn't a giant leap forward then they may find themselves consigned to irrelevance, from which they may never escape.