THE INDUSTRIAL ROCK OF THE GIFT SUGGEST THEY WERE LISTENING TO NINE INCH NAILS BETWEEN BAND SQUABBLES

INXS’s ninth LP arrived following the devastating Copenhagen attack which left their frontman with a fractured skull, impacted his ability to taste and smell and, according to those closest to him, changed his entire personality for the darker. Indeed, although its Capri island surroundings were idyllic, the recording of

Full Moon, Dirty Hearts was anything but, with a clearly troubled Hutchence increasingly prone to violent outbursts.

Little wonder, therefore, that their third collaboration with

Opitz isn’t exactly a laugh-aminute affair. Kill The Pain, which at times threatens to break out into Annie Lennox’s Why, is a haunting piano ballad where Hutchence sounds at his lowest ebb.

There’s a similar sense of despondency running through the early ambience of Freedom Deep before it bursts into the kind of widescreen desert rock U2 perfected on The Joshua Tree. And the barroom blues of the title track duet with Chrissie Hynde is more whisky-soaked requiem than celebratory singalong.

Even when the Aussies up the tempo, they can’t shake off the air of quiet menace. The industrial rock of The Gift suggests they were listening to Nine Inch Nails in between all the band squabbles. And the tendency to channel Jim Morrison with the spoken word segments on I’m Only Looking and fuzzy psychedelic closer Viking Juice serves as further proof that Hutchence was suffering an identity crisis.

Full Moon, Dirty Hearts isn’t all doom and gloom, to be fair.

After bumping into each other at a Parisian studio, INXS somehow managed to convince Ray

Charles to lend his gritty voice to the no-nonsense blues rocker Please (You Got That...).

And there are still signs of the Hutchence swagger on opener Days Of Rust and the Rolling Stones-ish stomper Time. But despite an exhaustive video campaign in which all 12 tracks were treated to promos directed by young filmmakers (was a young Beyoncé taking notes by any chance ?), the record adhered to the law of diminishing commercial returns.