It can be confusing keeping track of Shawn Smith and his various side projects. I mean what's the difference between a Shawn Smith album, a Pigeonhed album, a Satchel album and a Brad album? Well, if you're a fan of Shawn Smith like me then the answer is probably not much as you eat it all up in whatever package it comes. Which is good news as this is a bumper year for Shawn Smith fans. Very soon we'll have a new album from Brad and, in the autumn, an album from All Hail The Crown a band which features the late Andrew Wood's brother Kevin on guitar.

But getting back to the here and now we have 'Heartache And Honey'. 'The Return Of...' might as well be a declaration from the band themselves or a cry to arms from returning guitarist John Hoag as it takes no prisoners and packs quite a whallop with its densely layered guitars and monster of the week riffing. Satchel are back. The guitars are cranked up and brought to the fore. For those familiar with 'Some More Trouble' from 1996's 'The Family' - this is the direction that the band are going in.

'Seeing Stars' manages to sound jaunty and mean-spirited at the same time thanks to the musical chiaroscuro of Shawn's light melodic vocals set over John Hoag's deep and dark riffing.

As you'd come to expect from Satchel the coin has a flip-side and throughout the album are scattered Shawn's more plaintive offerings often stripped down to just piano or acoustic guitar. 'Since You've Been Gone' is one such acoustic example which has a creepy 'Welcome To My Nightmare' texture to it - it's the sound of someone irreparably damaged and perhaps crazy to boot. On the other hand 'Old Spirit' and 'Scold Me' are both piano pieces with the latter having a distinct hymn-like quality.

Depending on your musical background 'The Border' and 'Might As Well Be Dead' may conjure up images of Bon Jovi, Eagles or Neil Young. But beyond the evocative wild west song titles and balladic musical backbone lies a perfect illustration of Shawn's unique vocal style which owes more to the giants of soul than their rock counterparts. In the case of 'Might As Well Be Dead' that great might be Nina Simone. While 'The Border' has an early Tom Waits feel about it - he may not be strictly soul but Tom's certainly an old soul - even as a young man.

On the heavier side of the tracks both 'Clear Cut' and 'Solid Gold' evoke the band's grungier pedigree and also stir distant memories of Pearl Jam, Jane's Addiction and Mother Love Bone. 'Created A Monster' is a perfect fusion of thick dirty keyboards and bass underlaying tight punctual guitar. Bouncy is the key word here. If Jeff Goldblum put The Knack's 'My Sharona' and Toni Basil's 'Mickey' in one transporter pod and flipped the switch then this is what might crawl out the other end.

'Carrier Of Silence' starts off slowly and laconically with gently distorted guitars and could be a throwaway ending to the album. But the song gathers shape forming into a brilliant slow melodic dirge with a killer chorus which leads the album out on a high.

Satchel's dualistic character notwithstanding 'Heartache And Honey' has a consistently harder edge than any of their previous releases and is a fitting addition to the Satchel discography - they haven't had a blip yet.

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