In the 16 years since splitting his great 1980s band, the Replacements, Paul Westerberg has become alt-rock's David Bowie: every album sees hopeful fans proclaiming his latest record "his best since ..." His new one sees Westerberg in his most unlikely guise yet - soundtracking a kids' cartoon - so hopes for an artistic revival are redundant before one even turns on the CD player. In fact, it's a perfectly serviceable record of eight Westerberg songs - think an edgier Tom Petty or John Fogerty - augmented with four tracks by other artists.

The problem is the saminess. While the crunch of Westerberg's guitar satisifies when the album opens, by the fifth mid-paced, drive-time rock number, one craves variety. And when it comes, in the form of the ballad Good Day, it doesn't work: Westerberg's refrain of "A good day / is any day that you're alive" loses any emotional impact when you remember he's singing about cartoon animals escaping cartoon hunters.