Red Carpet Massacre  (Audio CD) 
by Duran Duran

It happens only two tracks in: Just when you're re-acquainting yourself with Simon Le Bon's sexy whine and settling in for a disc full of digestible, modernized new wave, Red Carpet Massacre takes a turn toward the Timberlake-like. By the time you reach track eight, the sizzling instrumental "Tricked Out," the effect is so pronounced you can't be sure whose chocolate got into whose peanut butter. But you do know this, and with more certainty than you once placed in the power of the "Hungry Like the Wolf" video to get you through your teen-age day: Massacre is one hot record. Timbaland, the brilliant knob-twister behind Timberlake's FutureSex/Love Sounds, as well as his protegé, Danja, imbue it with buoyancy and way-past-midnight moodiness; on a couple of tracks, most notably "Skin Divers," which includes a short rap verse, Timbaland pitches in on vocals, and on a couple of others, he taps Timberlake to help out. That the contributions of that tag-team of hitmakers take nothing away from the tightness and characteristic chic of the band--that they enhance the hypnotic sheen of Duran Duran, rather than subjugate it--makes a certain sense. After all, if Timberlake brought sexy back, it had probably only been missing since Duran Duran's mid-80s heyday. --Tammy La Gorce