The Black Lips have been known to court controversy. Their live shows have, at one point or another included vomiting, urination, nudity, (straight, male) band members kissing, eletric mini-car races, fireworks, a chicken, and flaming guitars. They were even chased out of India for performing 'homosexual acts' onstage and in September last year, incited a stage invasion that still remains a popular video on Youtube.

Take away the bat-shit crazy stage antics though and what you have underneath is a competent, lo-fi, garage rock band. The Black Lips latest single 'Drugs' (culled from their '200 Million Thousand' album) is a classic example of quality over quantity. Clocking in at just over 2 minutes it possesses not an inch of fat and sounds like it was recorded in a basement, on a 4-track in 1979. If that doesn't sound like something you'd want to hear you'd best steer clear.

There is nothing knowingly confrontational or 'odd' here, it's actually a pretty straight forward pop song given a scuzzy make-over and as such a rather ordinary song is given a new lease of life with a dirty atmosphere that hasn't been heard with this much conviction since The Strokes first record.

I find it hard to believe that an album of 12 tracks just like this would manage to hold my attention, but as a singles band The Black Lips are (on this evidence at least) a rousing success.