Don't ignore the promise of kinetic crackle that lies within the title of
Electric Light
,
James Bay
's 2018 sequel to his 2015 debut,
Chaos and the Calm
.
Bay
didn't bother with such tacky modern accouterments as electronic rhythms and pitch-shifted vocals on
, preferring a burnished, handsome classicism. All of that is thrown out the window on
, a loose concept album tracing the rise and fall of a romance, all set to modern soul grooves and bright neon hooks. The sonic shift is startling, but
grounds his second album with the same sturdy songcraft of
, so
is hardly all flash and style: beneath its glitter and blare, the songs are tight, melodic, and memorable, worming their way into the subconscious with ease. Still, the initial appeal of
-- and one that doesn't wane with repeated plays -- is how the album is vibrant, colorful, and alive in a way that
's debut simply wasn't. It sparkles with digital textures that give plenty of space for
to sing with a soulful abandon, a quality that wasn't necessarily evident on
either. Admirers of the deliberateness of the debut may find
a bit too slick and modern, yet that's precisely the album's appeal:
never seems like he's pandering; he sounds thrilled that he has a chance to make the kind of layered, genre-bending pop that he wants to make, and listeners may well find that freedom alluring. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine