Music for the People

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The children of Brit-pop have a habit of enthusiastically embracing tradition and recycling the music of their idols, perhaps less apparent on their debut releases, which often get by on untrammeled enthusiasm, but more obvious on their second albums. The Enemy's sophomore set, Music for the People, is a case in point, playing like a CliffsNotes of the past 15 years of British rock, including the hits of 1995; they used the verse of Pulp's "Common People" as inspiration for "Nation of Checkout Girls" and adapted Blur's "The Universal" for "Last Goodbye." This repurposing of the past isn't limited to the '90s: "Don't Break the Red Tape" stomps just like the Clash's "London Calling," "Keep Losing" crawls like David Bowie's "Five Years," there's a hint of a Johnny Rotten snarl on "No Time for Tears" and more than a hint of Paul Weller's working-class romanticism elsewhere, and the list could go on — all of it indication of the Enemy attempting to grasp the brass ring. Like so many of the children of Oasis, the Enemy could learn from the Brothers Gallagher and take their rock & roll less seriously.