Paul Weller - Fat Pop (Volume One) 4/5
Weller has always been prolific, not one for resting on his laurels, ‘Fat Pop’ is his sixteenth solo album! If you factor in his work with The Jam and the Style Council then it is his 27th album so you’d think that maybe he’s just putting out any old crap (we’re all looking at you Van Morrison) but alas this new album is a real blast of inventiveness.
The title gives an insight to the content, it's all big pop songs here and probably Weller’s catchiest body of work since the mid-nineties peak of ‘Wild Wood’ and ‘Stanley Road’.
Opening track ‘Cosmic Fringes’ sounds like Bowie recording with the Human League. There’s a drive to this album that we’ve not heard in a while. In fact I’d go as far as to say that Paul sounds like he’s having fun.
Pleasingly, the music sounds massive, chunky basslines propel the songs along while Weller’s guitar is sounding fresh particularly on tracks like ‘Failed’ or the acoustic ‘Cobwebs/Connections’. Within the lyrics a more romantic vision of life seems to be the core of the message. On the track ‘In Better Times’ Weller paints an optimistic vision of the future to the central character “In better times you will fly”.
