As detailed by Matthew Sheret in his rather marvellous daily blog project type thing three six five start, I’ve never had a lot of respect for The Distillers. That’s not to say that Brody Dalle doesn’t have a fantastic voice, but both live and on CD I was unimpressed by what I heard. The only exception to this is probably Drain The Blood but that’s mainly due to the one great riff they seemed to have.

For whatever reasons, Dalle now has a new band with a bunch of hired friends to help out along the way. Typifying the new style she’s going with, more PJ Harvey than a punk rock Angelina Jolie, is Baptized by Fire. There’s some similarities with Auf der Maur here as well – the ooh’s, nautical themes and strong female vocals.

It’s the electronic backbeat that comes into play in the chorus that really sells the track, though. It may be a cynical ploy to get radio play, or it might just be part of a great song. Either way, it doesn’t matter, because until the whole band is proved as anything other than a gimmick we can take it entirely at face value. I think there might be a mandolin in there as well.