Example: Won't Go Quietly

Apparently, when west London rapper Example, aka Elliot Gleave, was 10 years old he won a national poetry competition. Listening to From Space, the opening track on his second album, it's hard to see how that literary potential has been fulfilled: "I got brand new socks, pack of five/ I've been down the shops." The typical rapper bravado is expressed thusly: "Try pigeonhole me/ Other pigeons better watch." If that all sounds a bit junior school playground, he does have a point – much of Won't Go Quietly is hard to pin down. On the sleek dance-pop of the title track and Last Ones Standing's pummelling synths, he's a less irritating Calvin Harris, while on the piano-inflected Millionaires, he recalls former label boss Mike Skinner's way with the heartstrings. Elsewhere, Kickstarts is an exuberant electropop love song, Sick Notes (produced by dubstep pioneers Chase & Status) adds a grimier edge, and the whole thing ends with religious questioning on Won't Believe the Fools. Oddly compelling.