Album review: Cee-Lo Green, The Lady Killer

****Warner 75678892289, £12.99

On this, the only soul album you will need this or any other decade, Green proves himself the Funkmaster supreme beyond the catchiest bit of profanity in pop.

Massive hit F*** You sets the bar high, but the majority of this album clears it comfortably.

The vocal half of Gnarls Barkley oozes confidence and class on this fourth solo outing.

Bright Lights Bigger City arrives in a swirl of strings bouncing on stabs of rhythm guitar, leading in to the sanitised version of the tune de jour, Forget You.

Frankly, it lacks the impact of the Anglo Saxon original, unlike the rest of this varied and vital collection, from the Stax flavour of the steaming Cry to the luxuriant stomp of the Northern Soul-influenced It's OK.

Cee-Lo is not stuck in any particular soul era, investing every tune with contemporary urgency, with Please smouldering away like a warped James Bond theme. Satisfied summons the slick sound of 70s Philadelphia and filters it through a Motown backbeat to produce a compelling soul hybrid.

Gnarls Barkley fans should be even more satisfied by this old-school approach, which does not so much attempt to re-invent the wheel as put a new spin on it.

Download this: Please, It's OK

This article was first published in Scotland On Sunday, 31 October, 2010