Consumer Guide Album

Wire: Object 47 [Pinkflag, 2008]
Deprived of Bruce Gilbert's guitar, these fractious lifers return to and improve on their dance-rock '80s. From the scene-setting new-wavey relationship-gone-sour of "One of Us" to the climactic electropunk historo-fatalism of "All Fours," though not always in between, they remind you why they were a great band. But they should know better than to dis the Mekons, who still are a great band when the time seems right. B+