Clara Bow's family is happy that she seems to be Taylor Swift's new muse!

While Swifties believe the 34-year-old's album title will drop, The Ward of the Martyred Poetcould be a nod to her ex, Joe Alwynher recently released tracklist highlights Bow.

When the late actress's great-granddaughter, Brittany Grace BellWhen she saw that Swift, 34, named one of the songs “Clara Bow,” she couldn't believe it. She said TMZ on Friday, February 9, that Bow would love to see her family's name live on and that Bow would love to know that a new generation would hear her story and learn about her life.

Bell revealed that while Swift has never contacted her family about the song or played it for them, they are honored that Swift shed light on Bow and would like to connect with the pop star to get the backstory on how the track originated. But for now, Bell says she's just excitedly waiting to find out what the lyrics will be.

While Bow rose to fame as a silent film star in the 1920s, many, including Bell, believe Swift can identify with the actress because of the overwhelming amount of attention they both received. Bell addressed the similarity to TMZ, saying she thinks Bow and Swift's lives have a lot in common, as her legendary great-grandmother was the original “It Girl” and Swift is the modern “It Girl.” Furthermore, Swift's transition from country to pop music mirrors Bow's transition from silent films to “talkies.”

With Bow back in the headlines thanks to Swift's album announcement, Bell says her family hopes that this time the spotlight on Bow will focus more on her many accolades and talents, rather than the gossip and criticism she was subjected to during her career.

As for whether Swift dropped an Easter egg of the musical tribute to Bow during her recent Grammys look, Bell said she wasn't sure. However, she admitted that she was fascinated by the similarity of Swift's necklace to the one Bow was wearing at the time.

The department of tortured poets will be released on April 19 and will be Swift's eleventh studio album.

Van bruisende zangeressen tot terugkerende mannelijke rockers, 2023 was een heerlijk divers muziekjaar.

Hier kiest onze muziekcriticus ADRIAN THRILLS zijn top tien albums…

1. JESSIE WARE: Dat! Voelt goed! (EMI)

Jessie Ware kreeg meer zelfvertrouwen door het succes van haar Table Manners-podcast en bracht weelde en vrolijkheid naar 2023 met haar vijfde album – een album dat haar transformatie van zwoele fakkelzangeres naar discodiva met gouden stem bekrachtigde.

Geïnspireerd door Chic en Chaka Khan – en vakkundig geproduceerd door James Ford en Stuart Price – maakte haar feestafspeellijst gebruik van de geest van de legendarische New Yorkse nachtclub Studio 54.

2. BOYGENIUS: De plaat (Polydor)

Boygenius, ondanks de naam, een geheel vrouwelijke aangelegenheid, bundelde de songwritingtalenten van soloartiesten Phoebe Bridgers, Lucy Dacus en Julien Baker met briljant resultaat, en hun debuutalbum stond in april bovenaan de Britse hitlijst.

Het trio, uit Californië en de Amerikaanse Bible Belt, zong over hun leven als twintiger, maar versterkte hun aantrekkingskracht met een liefde voor poplegendes, van Paul Simon tot Leonard Cohen.

3. BLUR: De ballade van Darren (Parlophone)

Blur liet de Cool Britannia-routines uit de jaren negentig achter zich en bekroonde een triomfantelijke live-comeback en twee optredens in het Wembley Stadium met een album waarin het verlies van onschuld werd betreurd.

De sfeer was melancholisch – ‘een grote liefdesplaat’, aldus zanger Damon Albarn – maar nummers als The Narcissist en The Heights waren melodieus, oprecht en prachtig uitgevoerd.

4. OLIVIA RODRIGO: Lef (Geffen)

Muzikaal en tekstueel volwassen geworden, verhoogde de voormalige Disney-ster haar spel op haar tweede album. De Californische nam de introspectieve ‘bedroom pop’-stijlen van haar debuut uit 2021, Sour, en versierde ze met een energieke, punky-pop glans.

Haar ironische humor is soms te theatraal. Maar zoals het klassieke wraaknummer Vampire laat zien, weet ze wel hoe ze moet rocken.

5. LANA DEL REY: Wist je dat er een tunnel is onder Ocean Blvd (Polydor)

Er waren de gebruikelijke knipogen naar de rockgrootheden, van de Eagles tot Harry Nilsson, maar Lana Del Rey’s zesde Britse hitparade was ook haar meest onthullende album tot nu toe. Met cameo’s van pater John Misty en filmcomponist Jon Batiste gingen haar rijke fakkelliederen over familieherinneringen en de vergankelijkheid van roem. Ze is een talent in haar beste jaren.

6. DE ROLLING STONES: Hackney Diamonds (Polydor)

In een jaar waarin The Beatles bovenaan de hitlijsten stonden met hun ‘laatste’ nummer, Now And Then, draaiden hun eeuwige rivalen, de Stones, de jaren terug met hun eerste album met nieuwe nummers sinds 2005. Mick Jagger en Co. klonken volledig betrokken toen ze leverde uitbundige rockers, een tijdloze ballad in Afhankelijk On You, en – met hulp van Lady Gaga en Stevie Wonder – een grote finale in Sweet Sounds Of Heaven.

7. JASON ISBELL EN DE 400-EENHEID: Windwijzers (dertig tijgers)

Een andere verhalenverteller aan de top van zijn kunnen, Alabama-zanger en acteur Isbell combineerde complexe karakterstudies met hardrockende country-soul op een schitterende set van vier minuten durende popsongs.

Hij werd vakkundig ondersteund door zijn vijfkoppige band The 400 Unit, met vioolspelende vrouw Amanda Shires als belangrijk lid. Ter afsluiting van zijn jaar verscheen hij ook in Martin Scorsese’s Killers Of The Flower Moon.

8. JORJA SMITH: Vallen of vliegen (Famm)

Na vijf jaar Londen, waar ze in 2018 en 2019 de Brit Awards won, keerde Jorja Smith terug naar haar geboorteland Walsall om haar tweede album te maken, een schijnbaar moeiteloze mix van moderne R&B, lome jazz en alternatieve pop. Er werd gewisseld tussen zelfverzekerde ‘vliegende’ nummers en introspectieve ‘vallende’ nummers, maar de kwaliteit bleef hoog.

9. DEPECHE-MODUS: Memento Mori (Columbia)

HET verlies van oprichter Andy Fletcher, die in 2022 overleed, wierp een schaduw over het eerste album van de Basildon-band als duo, maar zanger Dave Gahan met slangenheupen en hoofdsongwriter Martin Gore maakten de gelegenheid waar met melodieuze nummers die teruggrepen op hun Gloriedagen van de jaren 80.

Of hij nu de rockgod speelt of de meelevende crooner, Gahan blijft de volmaakte frontman.

10. TAYLOR SWIFT: 1989 (Taylor’s versie) (universeel)

Zoals Dean Martin ooit over Frank Sinatra zei: het is de wereld van Taylor Swift, we leven er gewoon in.

Naast het verbrijzelen van kaskrakers met haar Eras-tournee, heeft Time Magazine’s Persoon van het Jaar twee van haar vroege lp’s opnieuw opgenomen.

Een uitgebreide versie van haar best verkochte album, 1989, was een hoogtepunt. Met vijf ongehoorde nummers die ‘uit de kluis’ zijn gered, zetten zelfs Taylor’s restjes anderen in de schaduw.

ALLES OUD IS WEER NIEUW…

De nieuwste reeks luxe heruitgaven zou aantrekkelijke, last-minute kousvullers kunnen opleveren.

ABBA: De bezoekers (polair)

Beoordeling:

Gemaakt te midden van twee mislukte huwelijken – Björn en Agnetha in 1980, Benny en Anni-Frid het jaar daarop – zagen The Visitors eruit alsof het Abba’s zwanenzang in de studio zou zijn… tot de komst van Voyage 2021. Het album uit 1981, dat opnieuw op vinyl verschijnt, toont een kwartet wiens commerciële fortuinen waren gedaald, maar wiens melodische kracht onverminderd groot bleef.

When All Is Said And Done en One Of Us documenteerden hun binnenlandse drama’s. Two For The Price Of One, over een menage à trois waarbij een man, een vrouw en diens moeder betrokken zijn, is het meest bizarre nummer uit de hele Abba-canon (2-LP, £44).

NIEUWE BESTELLING: Stof 1987 (Fabriek)

Beoordeling:

Deze voortreffelijke compilatie herhaalt hun status als een van de grote singlebands van de jaren tachtig en vertelt hoe New Order de Britse rock in het postpunktijdperk opnieuw definieerde door pulserende elektronica en New Yorkse dansinvloeden te integreren.

Deze geremasterde editie opent met debuutsingle Ceremony, waarvan de diepgetinte gitaren een echo zijn van het achtergrondverhaal van de band uit Manchester in Joy Division. Later veroveren meer clubgeoriënteerde releases, waaronder de 12-inch versies van Blue Monday en True Faith, hun imperiale fase. (2-CD, £ 14; 4-CD, £ 20; 2-LP, £ 44).

CHVRCHES: De botten van wat je gelooft (EMI)

Beoordeling:

Worden erfgoeddaden jonger? Nu de heruitgave-industrie zich richt op acts uit de jaren 2010, lijkt dat zeker zo, nu het Glasgow-trio Chvrches (uitgesproken als ‘kerken’) de tiende verjaardag van hun debuut markeert door het originele, twaalf nummers tellende album opnieuw te verpakken en te remasteren als een tweedelige versie. schijf bundel.

De warme, Glaswegiaanse tonen van frontvrouw Lauren Mayberry komen naar voren op de euforische synthpop van The Mother We Share. Een handvol voorheen ongehoorde nummers bevat instrumentalist Martin Doherty als leadzang (2-CD, £13; 2-LP plus 7-inch single, £34).

STAALDAN: Gaucho (Geffen)

Beoordeling:

Gaucho uit de jaren 80 is sinds de oorspronkelijke release niet meer op vinyl verkrijgbaar en is de nieuwste Steely Dan-klassieker die wordt geremasterd.

Net als Hotel California van de Eagles legden de liedjes de smerige onderbuik van het leven in LA bloot. Michael McDonald en Mark Knopfler verzorgen cameo’s op Time Out Of Mind, terwijl nummers als Glamour Profession en de single Hey Nineteen slimme woordspelingen combineren met ingewikkelde, jazzy arrangementen.

Soms te gelikt voor zijn eigen bestwil, is het nog steeds een waardige toevoeging aan een doorlopende serie die dit jaar Countdown To Ecstasy, Pretzel Logic en Aja (LP, £ 28) al opnieuw heeft bezocht.

TAKE THAT: This Life (EMI)

Verdict: Late career renaissance

Judgement:

HII MADNESS: Theater Of The Absurd presents C’Est La Vie (BMG)

Verdict: Organize a comeback

Judgement:

MÅNESKIN: Hurry! (Are you coming?) (Columbia)

Verdict: Fast progress

Judgement:

As former pin-ups – now in their 50s – Take That are in uncharted territory for a British boy band.

They weathered the years of teenage fan hysteria, survived a divorce and enjoyed the subsequent lucrative reunion tour. Now a slimmed-down trio, with just Gary Barlow, Mark Owen and Howard Donald remaining, they are looking for a fresh start.

This Life is their first batch of new songs since 2017’s Wonderland, a tired and predictable affair, and the trio call it the third chapter of a career that stretches back to 1990, when they formed as a quintet modeled on America’s New Kids . On the block.

Their first album, Take That & Party, was a dizzying mix of bubblegum pop and disco. Owen describes their latest incarnation as ‘a scruffy version of The Three Tenors’, although This Life’s delicate harmonies and strummed, soft-rock guitars place them closer to a down-home version of the Eagles, or folk-rock supergroup Crosby, Stills & Nash. They could have given themselves a new name: Barlow, Owen & Donald.

The twelve new songs lack the deceptive element that court jester Robbie Williams could possibly have brought to the table. (Robbie left Take That in 2014 – for the second time – with Jason Orange.)

But the survivors have regrouped well. There’s nothing too challenging here, but Gary, Mark and Howard have subtly pushed the dial without losing their love for a memorable chorus.

A sense of renewal is emphasized by two new employees. Nashville native Dave Cobb, who co-produced the 2018 soundtrack to A Star Is Born and collaborated with rock singer-songwriter Jason Isbell, pushes the band toward rustic Americana.

Another American producer, Jennifer Decilveo, adds synths and a drum machine, picking up where she left off on Owen’s 2022 solo album, Land Of Dreams.

A mature mood is evident from the start. Windows talks about emerging into the light after “a year of madness.” Brand New Sun finds Owen praising the importance of patience in keeping a long-term relationship alive.

Keep Your Head Up consists of sad strings and plaintive piano, and Mind Full Of Madness opens with a driving sixteenth-note guitar riff reminiscent of Stevie Nicks’ Edge Of Seventeen.

The songs sometimes fall into vague platitudes, but they address universal emotions with warmth and frankness.

Barlow wrote the title track, an upbeat piano piece with the feel of a middle-of-the-road 1970s pop single, after his son’s college graduation.

In One More Word Donald sings about raising his daughter. “You are the story of my life,” he concludes. It’s schmaltzy, but kind of sweet. Two of the best songs arrive late.

Time And Time Again contains harmony vocals that are comparable to Rule The World from 2007. Where We Are is an optimistic assessment of ‘the road ahead’.

Take That, once Britain’s biggest pop act, is slowly getting old.

What Take That was to the 1990s, Madness was to the 1980s: a great singles band.

There are traces of the group’s crazy boy tribe on their thirteenth album, but fans expecting repeats of ska-pop hits in the vein of Baggy Pants and House Of Fun should be wary. Theater Of The Absurd… is a concept LP about the dire state of the post-pandemic world.

Seen as a Music Hall production in three acts – with a prologue, epilogue and spoken word interludes by actor Martin Freeman – it highlights the darker tenor that has always lurked beneath that crazy facade.

Haunting images of London’s West End in lockdown dominate the Eleanor Rigby-esque Theater Of The Absurd, where singer Suggs promises to stage ‘the last and only performance of the cruellest cabaret’.

Things are equally bleak on the other title track, C’Est La Vie, which conjures apocalyptic visions of a “tyrannical heaven.”

There is wry lockdown skepticism on Set Me Free (Let Me Be) and a warning about the dangers of artificial intelligence on Run For Your Life.

The latter combines fatalistic lyrics with a shrill, funky tune in vintage Madness fashion. The feeling of fear is tempered by the belief that the show must go on.

If I Go Mad is a love letter from Suggs to his wife, singer Bette Bright. A sister song to 1982’s Our House, In My Street is a throwback to the days when a Madness song could cheer up the nation.

With this release looking to become their first-ever chart-topping studio album, they remain national treasures.

“We’re not punk, we’re not pop, we’re just music freaks,” Italian rockers Maneskin sang ten months ago on their third album, Rush!

As surprise winners of the Eurovision Song Contest 2021, the quartet has developed into an arena-filling live act with energy to burn.

An expanded version of Rush!, with five new songs, underlines their progress.

Two of the new songs, all sung in English, are ballads. Trastevere is set in Rome, the band’s birthplace.

Valentine is ridiculously over the top. “I cover myself with tattoos of us, and dream of the day we hug and burn,” Damiano David sings.

The other additions are cheerful, ranging from thunderous heavy metal to artistic, danceable indie pop.

Take That will launch a UK tour at the Utilita Arena, Sheffield, on April 13, 2024 (gigsandtours.com). Madness begin their tour next Thursday at P&J Live, Aberdeen (ticketmaster.co.uk). Maneskin plays at the AO Arena, Manchester on December 19 (livenation.co.uk).

JONATHAN TETELMAN: The Great Puccini (DG 486 4683)

Judgement:

Jonathan Tetelman, born in Chile but raised in New Jersey, is a tenor to watch, with a beautiful, cultured voice.

A year after his acclaimed first DG recital with arias recorded in Gran Canaria, he went to Prague to record this freshly sung album with Giacomo Puccini’s most famous tenor scenes.

It’s a bit early for the centenary of the composer’s death, but very welcome, as Tetelman is in better spirits than some of his great rivals and has a feel for Puccini’s phrasing.

The expected hit songs – ‘Che gelida manina’, ‘Nessun dorma’, ‘E lucevan le stelle’ – are here, but some selections are a bit unusual, like the scene from Madama Butterfly Act 3.

La Boheme gets three fragments, including the love duet with the excellent Federica Lombardi and the farewell quartet from Act 3; and in total Tetelman is supported by six other singers.

Music by Le Villi, Manon Lescaut and Il Tabarro is included; Carlo Rizzi conducts the Prague Philharmonia in an idiomatic manner, but the climax of ‘Nessun dorma’ sounds a bit strange.

ENJOY, GAUDETE! Choral music for Christmas (Naxos 8.574575)

Judgement:

The Christmas music on this CD is beautifully sung, but you may have already come across it, because it was released in 2011 on another label.

David Hill, one of our top choir leaders, conducts just 16 professional singers in the IKON ensemble convened for special projects.

The 2009 recordings of St John the Evangelist, Upper Norwood still sound good and my only reservation is that many of the arrangements are very awkward and unnecessarily complicated.

The simplicity of the Coventry Carol all but disappears under the weight of the harmonies Richard Allain piles on it, and some modern composers are guilty of this.

I do enjoy Kenneth Leighton’s GK Chestertoon setting and there are classics by Whitacre, Holst, Warlock, Joubert and Howells; the title track by Adrian Peacock was new in 2009.

TULLIE POTTER

When first released 50 years ago, The Beatles’ Red and Blue albums became the ultimate greatest hits compilations.

The two double LPs span the highs of the Beatlemania era (the Red album, 1962 to 1966) and the magical twists of the late 1960s (Blue, which took the story all the way to the group’s demise in 1970).

The band showed little interest in them at the time, with John, Paul, George and Ringo all pursuing solo careers and feuding over their business affairs, but Red and Blue remains the perfect introduction to the songs that changed pop. Noel Gallagher says they heralded his lifelong love of the Fab Four.

With the ‘final’ Beatles song, Now And Then, set to give the band their first No. 1 single since The Ballad Of John And Yoko in 1969, the two retrospectives are now getting the deluxe reissue treatment, with 21 newly added tracks and a fresh production polish that uses the same de-mixing technology that polished the decades-old demo of the new single.

However, this re-release is oddly timed. Over the past six years, archivists have painstakingly worked through The Beatles’ catalogue, collecting expanded editions of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (2017), The White Album (2018), Abbey Road (2019), Let It Be (2021) and Revolver (2022).

The obvious next step would have been to move on to 1965’s Rubber Soul. They went this route, one suspects, because Now And Then can now be added to Blue (to make it even more appealing).

But of these new packages, Red is the most compelling, offering a satisfyingly heady rush through early singles, from Love Me Do to Eleanor Rigby and Yellow Submarine.

The downside to Blue is that many of the new mixes were on previous reissues.

Remarkably, the original Red album only featured compositions by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, an oversight now remedied by the addition of two George Harrison tracks in Taxman and the jangly, Byrds-esque If I Needed Nobody. However, it is the new versions of the early singles that catch the eye.

Using the technology used by filmmaker Peter Jackson to make the 2021 Get Back documentary, producer Giles Martin (son of Beatles producer George) ‘isolated’ and remixed individual instruments from old tapes, staying true to the existing arrangements, but underlined the impression of a young rock band playing live in the studio.

The results are impressive. McCartney’s bass and Lennon’s harmonica are livelier on Love Me Do, and there’s a renewed punch to Ringo Starr’s drums on Can’t Buy Me Love and A Hard Day’s Night.

The string quartet sounds richer on Yesterday. If you can tolerate a little tampering with precious memories, there is plenty to admire.

The updated Blue album, which opens with Strawberry Fields Forever, describes the years in which, according to McCartney, The Beatles ‘took new directions without a map’.

Despite new mixes of Revolution and three songs from the 1967 Magical Mystery Tour EP, this version doesn’t have the same ‘wow’ factor as Red, although the reflective, emotional Now And Then doesn’t feel out of place.

If the latter tops the singles chart today, it will give pop’s biggest saga the happy ending it deserves.

Chris Stapleton, America’s favorite country star for mainstream singer-songwriters, has collaborated with Ed Sheeran, Taylor Swift and Justin Timberlake.

He sang with Pink on this year’s Trustfall album and dueted with Adele on a version of the latter’s Easy On Me. She describes his voice as ‘like caramel’.

Despite that – and the fact that tickets for next year’s UK arena tour are selling quickly – the Kentucky musician has yet to make a major chart breakthrough here.

His fifth album, Higher, will certainly help his cause: It challenges conventional Nashville wisdom by giving the bearded 45-year-old a chance to branch out into soft rock, tender R&B and acoustic Americana.

Overseen by A Star Is Born co-producer Dave Cobb and Stapleton’s wife, musician Morgane, Higher taps into the country’s storytelling traditions.

There are whiskey-soaked, guitar-driven rockers from the heart of the country hitting the road and leaving broken hearts, including his own, behind them. According to the song of the same name, South Dakota is a place where “trouble isn’t hard to find.”

He can also tender. The Day I Die and Weight Of Your World are tearjerkers, and in the bar ballad It Takes A Woman Stapleton embraces his inner soul, the man.

It takes a woman, he ventures, to make him “feel like a man.” His live show should have them dancing and crying in the aisles.

By From samba to light-hearted bossa nova, Liverpool band Baiana put their own spin on Brazilian styles on their self-titled debut.

The record, produced by Latin percussionist Snowboy, is based on singer Laura Doyle’s experience working in Rio, where she learned Portuguese and immersed herself in the local Carioca culture.

The grooves are relaxed and sun-drenched, decorated with strings on the easy-listening You Brought Me You, brass on Bossa Nova Dream and rhythmic vibraphone on The Birds And The Bees. Doyle evokes the torch singers of the swing era with an affectionate, sincere spirit.

DAMIAN LEWIS: Mission Creep (Decca)

Verdict: Sincere songwriting detour

Judgement: ****

TOM GRENNAN: What if and maybe (insanity)

Verdict: feel-good songs for summer

Judgement: ***

Damian Lewis knows exactly what he’s getting into. ‘It’s exactly what the world needs… another record from an actor’, says the film star dryly about his new career as a singer-songwriter.

With fellow thespians Kiefer Sutherland, Hugh Laurie, Jeff Goldblum and Scarlett Johansson all having released albums in recent years – and Johnny Depp seemingly happiest with a guitar in his hands – he has a point.

But 52-year-old Lewis, who played U.S. Marine Nicholas Brody in Homeland and Steve McQueen in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, steps into music with honorable intentions, and his debut album Mission Creep is nothing like a vanity project or midlife. . crisis.

A contemplative set of rock, folk and jazzy grooves, it’s a heartfelt affair with a natural feel.

After conceiving the songs, without co-writers, in lockdown, Damian was introduced to the London-based jazz musicians of Kansas Smitty’s House Band by the saxophonist of the septet Giacomo Smith, and it is they who have created most of the richly varied provide guidance. here, with Smith and slide guitarist Dave Archer in the foreground.

Inevitably, parts of this record reflect the recent turmoil Lewis has been going through. His wife, Peaky Blinders actress Helen McCrory, died of breast cancer in April 2021, and it’s hard to listen to the raucous yet poetic anthem She Comes without seeing it as an elegy to her: “She comes as a blackbird, she comes as a fox, she sits in front of a window, she sings from a rock,” Lewis laments.

But Mission Creep is otherwise more romantic than sad. Hole In My Roof may be a chronicle of late-night desperation, but the sense of melancholy is set against a backdrop of jazz-funk.

My Little One finds Lewis dabbling in rockabilly. Well, the album’s sole co-writer (with Smith) is an old-fashioned New Orleans swing piece.

There is a strange return to the day job. The compelling blues song Never Judge A Man By His Umbrella was inspired by his portrayal of secret agent Nicholas Elliott in the spy drama A Spy Among Friends.

There’s a hint of overenthusiastic fanboy in the album’s three covers, Neil Young’s Harvest Moon, JJ Cale’s After Midnight and Dr. John’s Such A Night.

But this is a playful but harrowing detour. Before becoming an actor, Lewis spent a summer traveling France and Spain with a guitar and a second-hand motorcycle, making this the culmination of long-held dreams.

Like Jessie Buckley, the actress who made a Mercury-nominated album with guitarist Bernard Butler, he makes a dramatic switch with surprising confidence.

• He made a name for himself as a gritty, blue-eyed soul man, but Tom Grennan gave a glimpse of what could be in last weekend’s Soccer Aid charity football game. The former winger of the Luton Town youth team was named player of the match for the second year in a row and also became the first person to appear in the televised pre-season friendly and deliver the half-time show, a tricky job he did well.

The Bedford singer, 28, brings a similar positivity to his third album, What Ifs & Maybes, mixing big, booming choruses with upbeat messages. Ballads are few and far between.

With Ed Sheeran opting to avoid direct earwigs on his latest album, Subtract, there’s a vacancy for a serious but fun male pop star – and Grennan is vying with Lewis Capaldi to be this year’s man of the year. Getting here has not been smooth sailing.

His latest album, Evering Road, dealt with his guilt at the end of a three-year relationship. There was also a rocky moment in February when he made a comment about Ellie Goulding’s metal breastplate to the British.

He quickly apologized, saying the nerves had gotten the better of him, and Ellie agreed there was no harm in it.

Party songs have never been high on his agenda, but What Ifs & Maybes changes that.

He uses his best falsetto on How Does It Feel, a finger-popping dance tune on which he begs an old flame for a second chance.

Remind Me finds two ex-lovers trying to recapture their lost passion. Here, as sung at Soccer Aid, preaches togetherness.

Many of these tracks were co-written and produced with musician Andrew Wells, who provides piano, guitar and bass, and span a range of styles. Sleeping Rough is a Coldplay-esque arena belter. Driven by twangy guitars and subtle beats, Psychedelic Kisses strives for the sunny optimism that is a calling card of Harry Styles and George Ezra.

Given that he’s such a versatile singer, Grennan sells himself short in sidelining ballads. Someone I used to know opens slowly but picks up the tempo, leaving only the closing track, You Are Not Alone, as a moment of sensitivity.

It’s one of the best things here, enhanced by the elegant strings of orchestrator Rosie Danvers, fresh from working with Noel Gallagher.

Perhaps he will leave introspection for another day.

But What Ifs & Maybes, while lacking the more subtle nuances of yesteryear, looks set to be one of the great pop albums of the summer.

• Both albums were released today. Tom Grennan is playing outdoor shows this summer (tomgrennan music.com). Damian Lewis plays Black Deer Festival and Union Chapel, London today, July 11 (damianlewismusic.com).

Beauty in blue! Queen Letizia of Spain stuns in an elegant wrap dress as she steps out for an awards ceremony in Madrid

By Maria Okanrende for Mailonline

published: 06:55 EDT, Jun 7, 2023 | Updated: 08:23 EDT, Jun 7, 2023