Last seen terrorizing our retinas with that scissors scene in Lars von Trier's 'Antichrist',  Charlotte Gainsbourg has returned with a third album (having released the first age 13 and featuring the infamous 'Lemon Incest' duet with her father, and a second, 5.55, following in 2006 in collaboration with Air). The perfect advert for what to do with killer genes and a book full of contacts, she has carved herself a niche in soft, seductive easy-listening that is a step far above that of her compatriots Nouvelle Vague. IRM sees Gainsbourg backed by veteran genre-pillager Beck, whose ever-resourceful ear for synths tempers Gainsbourg's whispered vocals with moody melancholia.

An unchained psych sound-haemorrhage with a sinister whiplash beat, title track IRM (French for MRI, as in the brain scan) sets the clinical-sexy tone, a dead-eyed but haunting take on sixties garage against a backdrop of hospital intercoms and machine noise.  Gainsbourg never quite shrugs off the persona of impassive hospital patient; she refuses to engage with lyrics or take risks as she does in her gut-wrenching film projects. Stylish but impassive, her voice rarely even strays far from speaking pitch, resting instead at a seductive whisper. Luckily enough, she has clouds of lush instrumental to rest on, with Beck's eloquent, cynical folk dragging tracks out of syrupy insubstance.

'In the End' is star-gazing, regretful and sad; 'Looking Glass Blues' a more assertive garage track punctuated with clashing cymbals. 'Me and Jane Doe' is a solitary, meandering downer, but for the most part Gainsbourg carries with aplomb her bewildering inability to hold a tune. The perfect soundtrack to late-night regrets (or, it's already been observed, the next film by Sophia Coppola), IRM has its charms but at times seems insouciant to the point of vacantness. Nevertheless, Gainsbourg’s hauntingly blank voice is the ideal canvas for Beck's lush and inventive web of sounds.