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Duran Duran Red Carpet Massacre (RCA) * * * Timothy 'Timbaland' Mosely has been responsible for some of the greatest pure pop songs of this decade. His Maneater turned the rather dull Nelly Furtado into a dancefloor phenomenon. Cry Me A River, which he co-wrote and performed on, made a post *NSYNC Justin Timberlake a bona fide star. Everyone from Bjork to Missy Elliott has recruited him to bolster their material. Now it's the turn of those 1980s survivors, Duran Duran, to seek some of that Timbaland magic. He has co-written three songs on Red Carpet Massacre and his mate Timberlake has lent his vocals to two of those tracks. Nite Runner bumps and grinds along appealingly, but it's like an outtake from Trousersnake's album rather than anything Simon Le Bon might be involved in. Falling Down offers a much more satisfying synthesis of these two pop generations -- it's the album's Ordinary World moment. The other Timbaland song, Skin Divers, is typical of his sleek, hip-hop orientated production style, and you could imagine it being adopted by any number of artists, but Duran Duran never make it their own. This, their 13th album, is no masterpiece, but it has enough well tooled synth-pop confections to appeal to fans from back in the day as well as Timberlake's constituency. True, they are relying on clever producers to give their songs an up-to-date feel -- just as they did with producer-du-jour Nile Rodgers back in 1987 -- but it's not nearly as cringeworthy as you might think.

Burn it: Falling Down

Courtesy Irish Independent