In Brief

* * Utah Saints, “Two,” Nettwerk America. On its 1992 debut, this duo was a leader of English techno mixing house and hip-hop sensibilities. On this belated follow-up, the Saints now sound like followers, covering territory well worn by Prodigy and the Chemical Brothers. Guest turns by Michael Stipe (phone conversations cut and pasted into impressionistic poetry) and such sample sources as Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” are at times arresting, but ultimately they seem like stunt casting.

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Albums are rated on a scale of one star (poor), two stars (fair), three stars (good) and four stars (excellent). The albums are already released unless otherwise noted.