Consumer Guide Album

Culture Club: This Time: The First Four Years -- Twelve Worldwide Hits [Epic/Virgin, 1987]
Stephen Holden thinks kids liked Boy George's singing more than I did because he evoked not a soul man but a synthesizer. Right: a synthesizer who wants to be your friend. His music is too nice to withstand much critical scrutiny, which means he's best when he puts a vaguely dishy edge on his female-identified pansexual humanitarianism: "Karma Chameleon," "Church of the Poison Mind," "Black Money." And the topper is "The War Song," which contributed more conspicuously to his U.S. downfall than mere heroin abuse. "War is stupid/And people are stupid"--now is that nice? B+