Sarcasm needn’t be the lowest form of wit – played right, it can be elegant and wryly withering. Teddy Thompson doesn’t have long enough tongue or deep enough cheek to pull the trick off with the aplomb and wit of ‘Everybody’s Happy Nowadays’ by the Buzzcocks, but A Piece of What You Need doesn’t collapse under the weight of its own irony, even in delivering infeasibly jaunty suicide notes or implausibly surprised cheerfulness. Which it does, suspiciously successfully – I think perhaps Mr Thompson fails to protesteth too much and too readily, and he actually is a happy-go-lucky type who wants to make bright, shiny pop songs. His aim is never particularly true – but aiming for Marshall Crenshaw and hitting the Travelling Wilburys is better than aiming for Nick Cave and hitting Renee Geyer, or for George Jones and hitting Conway Twitty. I bet he’s tired of being upset …