If there's one thing the past decade achieved, it was further emphasizing the amorphous, ambiguous meaninglessness of the word "pop." After all, every artist, no matter how outré, wants people to listen to their records, and ideally as many people as possible. Sure, some make it easier and some make it harder, but no one wants their music to be ignored. Still, those who aspire to make pop music as such presumably value accessibility, and there are any number of tricks-- studio, stylistic, marketing-- one can enlist to pull that off. Yet it's an uphill slog if you don't have the songs to begin with, and on that front the relatively under-the-radar Jack Peñate has a leg up.
This being the 21st century and all, Peñate's brand of pop is predictably broad. He's a soul singer, of sorts, but his voice is closer to a charming yelp than a smooth croon-- more Edwyn Collins or Terry Hall than, say, Jamie Lidell. His music, too, references horn-drenched R&B, but it also broadens its scope to include everything from Afropop to Tropicália. Best of all, it does so naturally, rarely coming off as some cynical or awkward train-jumping exercise. In this way Peñate's second album, Everything Is New, recalls 1980s UK pop at its most blinder-free: dance music that doesn't pander, globetrotting grooves that don't over-reach, songs hardly short on hooks but not smug about them, either.
The title track, with its polyrhythmic percussion, strings, harps, and copious other overdubs, could have gone the overblown route, but as busy as it may be, it's never less than down to earth in its homebrew house party vibe. "Pull My Heart Away", "So Near", and "Be the One" explore different sides of soul, the former slower and more melancholy despite its handclaps and massed backing vocals, the latter two string-laden disco but far from unctuous in their historical references. "Body Down" is down-tempo jazzbo rock that makes room for backwards vocals and a noisy space guitar breakdown.
When Peñate does incorporate non-Western elements, he does so minus the usual distracting assembly seams. "Tonight's Today" and "Give Yourself Away", for example, have as much West African funk in them as London club, but they don't sound like shallow fashion-parade pastiche. And when Peñate gets moody or weird, as he does on "Every Glance" and the herky-jerk "Let's All Die", respectively, he does so in keeping with the same sense of sophistication and stylistic scope that pervades and informs the rest of the album. It's harder to pull off than it sounds, but no less easy a listen for it. It's wide-eyed pop minus the fizz, demonstrating that sizzle can still be subtle.
