As far as simple pleasures go, good music will always top the list. There’s nothing like the manufactured angst of another person to soothe our own worries. Like anyone, I love a good emotional ballad. I think this one is well on its way to becoming a classic – at least in my canon! Jake Bugg, of course, has established himself as an artist who’s here to stay. As I was saying last week, the boy wonder had to deal with the growing pains of growing out of his ‘boy wonder’ hype. A challenge for any artist who burst out very young. Bugg has the advantage that he’s always sounded wiser than his years, which makes it easier to become an actual mature adult. (As opposed to someone trying to outgrow an adolescent persona.) Hype itself can do as much harm to a young career as it does good, and it must be a relief to be able to operate and make creative choices without having all that pressure. So here is a young man who got clobbered with a lot of hype right out of the gate, and he’s been growing up ever since, with increasingly less hype but more creative freedom. Some people thought Jake Bugg’s second album was a let-down, after all that hype. Too well-produced! Too similar to the first one! I did think that the Rick Rubin treatment was uncalled for; not every promising young talent needs to be bundled off to Rick Rubin. But in the context of the artist’s progression, it’s a very natural second step, and as you can hear, there’s some great songwriting going on.
