**
First things first, let’s sort out the elephant in the room. I have nothing against Busted. They made decent angsty pop-rock that kept many 12-year-old girls with asymmetric fringes very happy for a brief period in the early noughties. Also they provided a platform for the vastly superior pop gems of McFly, for which we should all be eternally grateful (and no, I won’t take it back, bits of Room on the 3rdFloor really do remind me of early Beatles). Given this undeniably fluffy background, lead singer Charlie Simpson has done well for himself, carving a respectable niche with post-hardcore outfit Fightstar. Young Pilgrim is a similarly respectable, if rather derivative, debut solo release.
The album comes with a good pedigree, being produced by The Cure and Coldplay collaborator Danston Supple, and is undeniably well-made. Opener ‘Down, Down, Down’ provides a decent platform for some pleasing close harmonies, finger clicks and swelling strings, although Simpson’s reasonably soulful vocal fails to disguise slightly awkward lyrics, as his heart “swells to the size of an orchid”. Lead single ‘Parachute’ demonstrates well-executed, catchy pop rock, but the skittish drums, baritone vocal and hammered piano seem to be trying a little too hard to be distinctive. Like much of Young Pilgrim, ‘Parachute’ feels like it’s trying to be an out-take from one of The National’s albums, when really it’s all much more Chris Martin than Matt Berninger. Consequently, on first listen I find myself gripped by a desperate desire to press pause and go to jerk around my kitchen in an arrhythmic manner to High Violet. Possibly not a side effect that Simpson intended.
Simpson has a pleasingly smoky baritone and can write a catchy chorus, as can be perceived in the bouncy refrains of ‘Suburbs’ and ‘Cemetery’, but these skills are smothered throughout by the sort of bland production that makes Dido sound feral. The layered vocal opening to ‘Hold On’ clearly seeks to emulate Bon Iver, but a potentially powerful idea is overwhelmed by the sort of bland electric guitar figures and soft-rock drum beat that Justin Vernon wouldn’t touch with a barge-pole. It seems unfair to directly compare Simpson’s debut with such distinctive talents, but the obvious references to these high profile acts, whether intentional or not, make it difficult to assess Young Pilgrim on its own merits. Tracks like ‘Farmer and Gun’, which actually involves a harmonica, hit the blue-grass clichés so hard that it just feels a bit phoney.
Young Pilgrim is not bad, it’s just a bit dull. When this sort of throwback Americana has been done much better elsewhere by genuine yanks such as Josh Ritter and the Avett Brothers, it seems a little pointless to so consciously ape them. Unless Young Pilgrim has been deliberately constructed as a gateway album to give eager teens a taste for the strong stuff, in which case it’s providing a commendable service and Simpson’s management should be congratulated for their altruism. Unfortunately, Young Pilgrim lacks the emotional and musical range to provide the intensity you crave. All too often, Simpson sends you off with a Southern Comfort and Coke to the local park, when what you really want is to lurk malevolently on your porch with a neat Jack Daniel’s and a shotgun.