Since reinventing himself as a Twitter banter lord a few years ago, James Blunt has proved he can do more than just mewl about pretty women and give cockney rhyming slang a new lease of life. But can he carry the genuinely entertaining Blunt 2.0 over into his songcraft? Will he even try? Judging by the album’s opening seconds, in which he moans humourlessly that “people say the meanest things” through a mouthful of whistling sibilance, the answer would seem to be: not in the slightest. And while the lyrics may be banal and inoffensive – bar a few moments of pause-and-rewind strangeness including references to “modern friends” and “beautiful” mothers (not his) – the music is actively risible, with Blunt having adopted a watered-down version of Justin Bieber’s asinine tropical house. It smacks of a desire to edge on to Radio 1 playlists and into student nights incognito, but only serves to highlight how irritating the sound has become. Perhaps, with his slightly desperate iteration, Blunt will help put this particular musical trend out of its misery.
