Bananarama's first album sounded like Fun Boy Three without the boys, but definitely with their ironic sense of "fun." The female trio's remake of "He Was Really Saying Something," with its drop-dead, blasé reading of the key line "Bop bop shoobee do wa-ah," was a girl-group classic.

Their new album sounds like the Coconuts without Kid Creole: in a word, insipid. Producers Tony Swain and Steve Jolley must have sought to duplicate the sound of early Petula Clark records - you don't get that sound without trying. And the LP is totally lacking in irony - a fact that makes Bananarama's Top Ten British hit, "Robert De Niro's Waiting," freakishly fascinating. "Robert De Niro's waiting/Talking Italian," they sing. (RS 424)

DON SHEWEY