Had Christopher Columbus Hunted Records... Gruff Rhys, Hotel Shampoo.

Innovative and ingenious are adjectives that ought to be inherent to the songwriter. And in the case of the perpetually super, periodically furry Gruff Rhys, such vocabulary embodies his back catalogue concisely. Having written more songs than there are quavers in Vivaldi's audio annum, you'd bet Cardiff on his every release pushing more boundaries than the previous. Hotel Shampoo, whilst devoid of any hits per se, is a resplendently simplistic, infinitely delectable record, as saccharine-sweet as, well, Honey All Over. Never one to turn to turgid social comment to bulk out an opus, Rhys' latest is so liberating, so off the wall it's squeezing itself through the bars of contemporary music confinements and making a bolt for the Shark Ridden Waters of the Bermuda Triangle, as lavish orchestration waltzes with odes to Vitamin K and lyrics of scenic nuclear power stations and bright fizzy pop oozing around in gurgling stomachs.

Originally conceived as Rhys' attempt at a despondent LP bulging with melancholic pianoforte balladry, despite the soaring string-led minor key theatrics of At The Heart Of Love and the woozy Vitamin K, Hotel Shampoo is unapologetically perky, so much so that it'd run off with sheets and blankets besides toiletries upon check-out. Sensations In The Dark harks back to Rhys' Patagonian odyssey documented in the fantabulous Separado, as horns plucked from the Buena Vista Social Club blare around his sumptuous North Welsh croon, whilst Take A Sentence glistens with a Robbie Williams-cum-Louis Armstrong pop sheen, before its brass intro is permeated by Gruff pleading for his senses to be "coloured in crayon", blurring coherence spectacularly. Ineradicable lines can be pencilled between certain points contained here within and previously penned dots, as Sophie Softly reworks the head-under-pillow mellowness of the calm before the storm of The Man Don't Give A Fuck, and the calculatedly raucous Patterns Of Power could seamlessly intertwine itself in Love Kraft but it's when Rhys' meanders off into the recesses of his mind that Hotel Shampoo froths and foams into excellence. The delicate duet Space Dust #2, featuring Sarah Assbring of El Perro Del Mar fame, tells the tale of eyes catching and flickering at a seminar amidst xylophone plinks and sullen strings, and is utterly absorbing as Rhys' vocals muffled through wispy facial hair ruffle neck hairs. If We Were Words (We Would Rhyme) meanwhile provides a forlorn, yet ultimately beguiling highlight, Rhys' sticking to brief, producing an utterly timeless piano ballad centred around glorious allegory. The retro-tinged Christopher Columbus sounds like a deteriorating reel of 35mm film documenting The Rattles, The United States Of America and Wolf People skimming stones on Brighton shingle, whilst Rubble Rubble is as close as Rhys has sailed to wondrously trashy, metronomic synthpop. Ceaselessly impeccable, every hotel arrival pack ought to contain a copy of this one.