Finley, Finley, Finley....

The first time I heard Finley Quaye was on a 50p remaindered sample cd rescued from the Camden branch of the Vinyl Exchange. The recommendation had been from a friend of mine who claims to have come up with "the Tricky spin" on this new reggae artist who was going to wipe away all competition and blast a new trail through the world of music with his easy-going reggae lite. He was employing his beautiful and understated voice over grooves that were strategically provided by some ex-members of Bob Marley's Wailers.

Half right, then. The singles from the glorious first album, 'Maverick a Strike' were pure slabs of sunshine filled joy, and everyone wanted a piece of this impossibly cool and handsome young man.

It turned out that he wasn't really Tricky's uncle, and they ended up fighting over this in a much publicised and brattish series of brawls in New York.

The second album failed to yield a single successful song, and I bought my second Quaye product (the _ 'Vanguard'_ album) for the same price that I had paid for the first sampler.

Enough history.

This is a lovely single; a collaboration with William Orbit and Beth Orton is a surefire guarantee of pop spangliness. Wierdly enough, suddenly the young Quaye boy goes all Bono on our asses, and the track sounds like a rocking All Saints number.

I hope it does the business, because it has all the trademarks of a summer smash, but what happened to our great reggae hope? Personally, I think he is definitely better when kicking against the pricks, rather than when he thinks he is rolling with the punches