2004's 'Mystic Bud' was essentially a solo album for the Blue Orchids frontman Martin Bramah. A strong album, it should have reinvented Bramah as a mature songwriter with added folk influences for good measure. 'Slum-Cavern-Jest!' sounds much more like a band effort and is - if anything - a move back to the ugly, scabrous rock of his early 80's roots. Borrowing from the dirtiest aspects of blues and country music, it recasts Bramah as the bitter voice of the underdog; helped by a murky production and some even murkier basslines. Whilst 'Strangely Lucid' is mournful, the drunken swagger of 'Green Rocky Road' suggests too much moonshine was consumed. This thirty-minute mini album is bookended by the lurching, thoroughly evil sounds of 'Laid Low' and only 'Necessity' even approaches a regular tune. That shouldn't put off followers of the band, though, who will welcome the comeback of an artist who refuses to compromise and that, in itself, deserves a certain grudging respect.