George came back after a lengthy absence with the dull – yet admittedly poignant – ‘Jesus To A Child’.  It would’ve been easy to write him off at that stage as a dreary balladeer now he was settling into his 30s, but ‘Fastlove’ blew that idea right out of the water and he’s never looked back.
 
Ok, he probably has looked back, what with the massive deterioration in quality of his output after this, but, you know, at least he’s always tried to keep the funk alive, even slumped over a steering wheel or cavorting around some park loos.  Good old Giorgios.
 
Where were we?  ‘Fastlove’ is dangerously smooth and leather-interiored, but somehow it retains an edge.  For all his out-and-out popness, George has always had cred; he knows where it’s at, what it looks like and how it should sound.  This record had a groove appeal from the Patrice Rushen sample on down, and it flaunts this appeal with huge sass and huger confidence.  Even the corny lines – “Why don’t we make a little room in my BMW, babe”, “I do believe that we are practising the same religion” – only serve to underline the song’s chutzpah.  George gets a wry smile, not a head-in-hands cringe.
 
From Junior, he gets a perfunctory shimmy, a dancing toy baby and a flat refusal to leave the waste bin alone.  In short, a blistering satire on his recent output.