Beth shows her true colours...

Beth Ditto is not in our good books, and hasn't been for a while. We haven't got round to explaining the full story of our unsavoury encounter with our former icon at Latitude Festival, but let's just say she's still got some making up to do. She's making baby steps with the next single from Simian Mobile Disco, a fantastic (and British!) electro duo who made the sound of our summer in 2006 with this. "Cruel Intentions", on which she guests, does exactly what we always hoped a Beth Ditto guest song would do - sound like a throbbing, ominous electro-dance Ibiza anthem - something her vocals are perfectly suited to. The backing track would be thrown away without another thought to it on it's own, which is the downfall of many an electro act who often enough believe they can fill an album with melodies they have put together without vocals. Unfortunately, it is very rare (and not impossible, we can name a few instrumental tracks we adore) that this is sufficient, and Ditto's warbling makes the song what it is. We were hooked on the "Call me up, we'll hang out" refrain which adds an icy poignancy to the closing of the track, and would love to hear this beefed up in a stinky grot of a pub in Shoreditch this summer.