Heavily filtered vocals play with rhythmic, poppy melodies that could have come from 1983 to create the principal building blocks of Jack Peñate’s second album, Everything Is New, but only a couple of tracks are able to deliver the goods without being smothered by a hodgepodge jelly of world and jazz sounds, mucking up what could have been golden hooks and groovy themes. Peñate’s tunes get lost in their own musicality, and, at the end of the maze, it’s hard to find a reason to go through it all again.
Still, the standout tracks are worth an iTunes purchase, and it wouldn’t be right to undersell Peñate as a musician—hey, there’s always room for retribution on a later album—because songs like “Pull My Heart Away” and “Body Down” are well layered and drawn together with the skill of a true artist. All of it would be much more fun and interesting live; sadly the instrumental orgy just doesn’t translate the same way on a record.
Even for Britpop, it’s muddled and confused. It’s almost danceable, almost hummable, and sometimes it’s a foot-tapper or a head-bobber, but this is the music industry, not horseshoes or hand grenades, and acts today score slam dunks and holes in one left and right. Jack Peñate needs to find a way to make his music more specific, yet still bottle his knick-knack musical style. Finesse is the key to his next album’s success or failure.
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