Benson Boone’s New Album is too Try-Hard – ryan

BLESS HIS Heart.
Photo: Benson Boone Via YouTube

Benson Boone is a nice young man who Became World Famous Writing the Sort of Gutting, Howling Ballad You Might Encounter in AI-Prompts Starring Weeping Puppies and Shipwrecked Babies or On Line at the Bank. “Beautiful Things,” The Lead Single Off the 22-Yaar-Old West Coast Singer-Stonger’s 2024 Debut Album, Fireworks & RollerbladesRode a pleading Vocal and Chugging Guitar Riff to Massive Renown, Topping Charts from Romania to Ireland to Portugal. “Oh God,” The song Adjura, “don’t take these beautiful things that got it!” IT’S A Frosty Record About Being in Love, Its Sweetness Coming Into Conflict with the BibliCal Notion of a Jealous God Seeking the Lion’s Share of Human Administration. An unusual thiught – what if you love someone so much that your maker took umbrage? -Yielded the Most InesCapable Single of 2024. Shockingly, But Also Fittingly, It Came From An Ex-Mormon American idol DROPOUT WHO SIGNED TO IMAGINE DRAGONS Yowler Dan Reynolds’s Night Street Imprint. These are not typical ingredients for a cross-cultural radio smash.

The list of 21st-centenary Chart Sensations Who Grew Up in the Church of Jesus Christ-Day Saints is Compact but Very Pertinent to Boone’s Ambitions: The Retro-Fabulist Zest of the Killers’ Brandon Flowers, the Operatic Loquaciousness of Panic! At the Disco’s Brendon Urie, and the Off-Puttingly Pure Earnestness of Reynolds Are BluePrints. Boone’s Sophomore EFFORT, American HeartOut Today, Also Looks Further Afield to ’70s Glam,’ 80s Synthy-Rock, and 2010s pop on a hero to see a contemporary style that facilitates the backflipping and vocal skydiving his gigs now center. Increasingly Seething Backlash Against Bone SEEMS TO DOUBT THERE MORE TO THE TV AND INTERNET STAR TURNED GRAMMY NOMINEE THAN HIGH-Flying Antics. Boone is aware: “if you have me or my music, at least have a good reason for it,” he insisted in an appril tiktok clip. But the Musical and Kinesiological Grandstanding that People pisses off Ticked up Rather than Down in Recent Weeks. Boone Managed to sneak a backflip into an interview with Jimmy Fallon. Onto Saturday Night Livehe doubles down on the dandy gymnastics that incenssed Grammy Viewers who learned How enthusiastically he delivers “Beautiful Things” onstage. butt Heart Veers away from the Christian-College Coffehouse Vibes and the stomping, whooping bars of the debut album and the Big Hit. Painting Broadly on A Still Relatively Fresh Canvas, Boone Expresses an Endearing Willingness to Grow His Craft But Also A Stele Reverence to Painfully Obivious Points of Reference.

Boone’s Predecessors and Influents-Pop-Vocal Grammy Nomines Like Harry Styles, Sam Smith, and Shawn Mendes-Are Never Hard to Spot. The Screechy Hook With The Gently Placed “Damn” in “Reminds with of you“Approximates Bruno March and Ed sheeran’s Boyish toneshattering in desperation. The High Notes Introducing the Chorus of “Momma Song” cut the way Adele’s Voice Sharpens and ascends in the process of Dropping a thermonuclear hook. The Peppy Synthy-Punk Love Song “I have been to one you call” is a tour de force of mixing and matching family signatures: the airport-reggae scatting of auhts fedora-bro folk folds ino the jittery of the strokes and Neon trees Beppore Going Full Queen + Adam Lambert in a Shouting coda. Most pop stars don’t rifle through all those ideas in a single song. And Few Wold Dare to Schedule the Three Songs-The Lilting Blue-Eyed Soul of “Reminds,” The Reverent Piano Balladry of “Momma,” and the post-punk revival-revival moment of “call”-in a row, or on the suame album. (Miley Might.) Like an episode of Idolevery damn thing here Reminds you of someone who made a splash beforehand. And it in that in that twisting sound and center of gravity that boone aims to make his mark.

But Boone’s Musical and Visual allusions to the songs and Stage Demeanor of Neon Trees’ Tyler Glenn, Mendes, Smithand Stylesand Older Inspirations like Freddie Mercury, David Bowie, and Elton John Never Gets As Combivative, As Up Against Sociopolitical Odds, nor the assumed or implicit quueerness in their music and fashion. His art is Currently Most arresting as a feat of athleticism; There’s the Little Consternation In Its Vision of America, Though the Flag-Daved Cover Art and Synth-you Heartland Rock Bits SEEK UNSUBTLE SPRINGSTEEN-available. The Big Source of Drama In Heart is the presumption of the prayer in “Things” going unanswered; It focuses on a Bad breakup and sparkingly Carnal Scenes from the rebound. The Wailing “Man in Me” and the Winking “WANTED MAN” DELLING A SENSE OF MASCULINE FROM BEING LOVED AND LUSTED AFTER. “MR Electric Blue” Toasts to a “Goodworking American” Who’ll “Make You Bite the Dirt” in a Scrap. The Latter Track, Which a Rolling Stone Interview Says is About Boone’s Father, Carries Hints of The man who sold the world and Ziggy stardust and styx’s “Mr. Roboto” in Its awe for an inspiring otherworldly figure. While the elders framed their characters as messianic figure Saving Humanity from Calamity, “Blue” only wants you to know this alien fucks and fights. (The Video Leans into Bione’s Chad Side to Get A Rise Out of Haters But Accidentally Accentally How HIS OBLIGHT FLASY ’70s Threads Screams Evel Knievel Wey’re Going for “Rocket Man.”) The Most Unique Points in the Singer Singers – up in the whirllwind of notority and the los angeles music industry while you’re building a new worldview and persons – are like sidelined. When the boone wants to get more probing than the “What if a be benatar song were also an imagine dragons song?” Query that “wanted man” Answers, he’ll be a formidable force in pop.