403: Fury

3121 (2006)
If this was a list of greatest live songs Fury would almost certainly be top 20. Blistering performances on Saturday Night Live and The Brit Awards excited fans and girded them for a snarling rock behemoth on the upcoming 3121 album but the studio version couldn’t quite live up to the incendiary hype. Its influences were too evident. Made from rubbing the flint vocal structure of Girls & Boys with the steel synth hook of 1999, the resulting guitar flames that lick at the track never quite reach the heights of his televised inferno but playing it ear-bleedingly loud goes some way to make up for it. The single release also featured some his best artwork to date, going for a psychedelic Hendrix vibe, but if you were thinking of trying to convert any Jimi lovers I’d play the b-side – the Brits performance with Wendy and Sheila E – where his guitar immolates the minor-key recycling of the aforementioned 1999 riff. Hell hath no fury like a Telecaster shredded.