A Guilty Pleasure?
The second song to be taken from The Long Blondes album, 'Couples', 'Guilt' is a slinky and funked-up slice of disco that threatens to revive the 80's right in your living room. It’s full of fruity guitar riffs and a feisty bass line and casts singer Kate Jackson as a something of a vixen, turning down unwanted attention; it's this combination of rather grating subject matter and repetitive licks with the pitch of the Bee Gees that create the problem for this writer. There's no doubt that it's a great tune; it's just also undoubtedly a little cheesy as it shuffles along and the closing, conspiratorial whisper, "You know what it's like, it happens to everyone once or twice," only seeks to alienate those who don't empathise with the terrible problem of choosing whether to cheat on one's partner all the more. There are far more classy tunes that would serve far better as an introduction to The Blondes.