Culture Club: Kissing To Be Clever (Epic/Virgin)

JUST WHEN you thought the last thing you needed was another washed-out attempt at dance music, along comes Culture Club to smash all your preconceptions about Brit-funk. Sure, their songs run on the expected formula of equal parts funk, reggae and post-disco dance rock, but what sets Culture Club apart from the other dance-floor detritus is that all of the band's rhythmic energies are exerted on behalf of an unstinting melodic sensibility. Not only that, but the band even boasts a singer who can do these songs justice, filling out each phrase with just the right touch of vibrato and shading, instead of the flat, nasal honk we have come to expect from Brit-funkers.