Sweet Baboo: Boombox Ballads | Album Review

Sometimes the best songs are the most simple ones.

Stephen Black is the kind of songwriter who has a clear understanding of the melodies and rhythms that hit that sweet spot time and time again.

The Welshman's fifth album incorporates the lush orchestration of Burt Bacharach's opuses on Walking in the Rain and the perky eccentricities of indiepop acts like Super Furry Animals and Belle & Sebastian on Tonight You Are a Tiger.

Got to Hang On To You sounds like The Divine Comedy transported to Wigan Casino in the 1960s and the joyful brass of You Got Me Time Keeping is distinctly Dexys-esque.

Packaged alongside Black’s wry lyric sheet, it’s sweet, uncomplicated and eminently easy listening.

[ sweetbaboo.co.uk ]