1982 will forever be known as the year that the punks got class -- or at least when and , rivals for the title of Britain's reigning Angry Young Man -- decided that they were not just rockers, but really songwriters in the tradition. ( , fellow angry Brit, sat this battle out, choosing to work with producer instead.) Both had been genre-hopping prior to 1982, but 's announced to the world that both were "serious songwriters," standing far apart from the clamoring punkers and silly new wavers. In retrospect, the ambitions of these two 27-year-olds (both born in August 1954, just two weeks apart) seem a little grandiose, and if didn't live up to its masterpiece marketing campaign (stalling at number 30 on the charts without generating a hit), it has garnered a stronger reputation than , which was a much more popular album, climbing all the way to number four on the U.S. charts, thanks to the Top Ten single had greater success because it's sleek and bright, entirely more accessible than the dense, occasionally unwieldy darkness of . Plus, plays up the comparisons to classic songwriting by lifting his album title from , dividing the record into a "night" and "day" side, and then topping it off with a neat line drawing of him at his piano in a New York apartment on the cover. All of these classy trappings are apparent on the surface, which is the problem with the record: it's all stylized, with the feel eclipsing the writing, which is kind of ironic considering that so clearly strives to be a sophisticated cosmopolitan songwriter here. He gets the cosmopolitan, big-city feel down pat; although the record never delivers on the "night" and "day" split, with the latter side feeling every bit as nocturnal as the former, his blend of percolating rhythms, jazzy horns and pianos, stylish synths, and splashy melodies uncannily feel like a bustling, glitzy evening in the big city. On that front, is a success, since it creates a mood and sustains it very well. Where it lets down is the substance of the songs. At a mere nine tracks, it's a brief album even by 1982 standards, and it seems even shorter because about half the numbers are more about sound than song. gets by on its form, not what it says, while are swinging -flavored jams that disappear into the air. is a novelty pastiche that's slightly off-key, but nowhere near as irritating as where mimics 's hyper-manic vocal mannerisms. These all fit the concept of the LP and they're engaging on record, but they're slight, especially given 's overarching ambition -- and their flimsiness is brought into sharp relief by the remaining four songs, which are among 's very best. There is, of course, the breakthrough hit which pulsates anticipatory excitement, but the aching is just as good, as is the haunting and the album opener, a vibrant, multi-colored song that perfectly sets up the sonic and lyrical themes of the album. If all of played at this level, it would be the self-styled masterpiece intended it to be. Instead, it is a very good record that delivers some nice, stylish pleasures; but its shortcomings reveal precisely how difficult it is to follow in the tradition of . ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine