Years & Years, Night Call, review: Olly Alexander turns the hedonism up loud – Telegraph.co.uk

Bless Olly Alexander. Its not easy to be the newly-minted emblem of queer activism in mainstream pop, while also keeping a legion of teenage girls giddily bopping along to your every tune. Doing this while charting a credible creative trajectory that will ensure longevity is a heavy lift, even for the most seasoned and confident of artists. Emboldened by considerable swagger, the talented but still evolving 31-year-old takes a bold swing at all three on the third Years & Years album, Night Call, a trend-savvy dance-pop collection,with results that succeed and confound in equal measure.

After the 2021 departure of Mikey Goldsworthy and Emre Trkmen, Y&Y is no longer a band, but rather a brand for Alexanders solo musings. Its a wise move that not only allows him to trade in on the established familiarity of Y&Y, but also to conjure an image that matches the sonic bombast of Night Call with Alexander cleverly casting himself as the charismatic, larger-than-life frontman.

This album marks Alexanders return to recording after a four-year break that included starring in the acclaimed television drama Its A Sin, which told the story of Aidss impact on 1980s Britain. Its a role that merged his sizeable pop following of over nine million monthly Spotify listenerswith a larger audience. Y&Y was formed in 2010, coming into prominence in 2015 with the chart topping album Communion, which was the years fastest-selling debut by a band. It spawned the No. 1 smash King, as well as Shine, which peaked at No 2 on the charts. The 2018 follow-up, Palo Santo, was a top 10 success that included the hit singles Sanctify and If Youre Over Me.

It seems that the experience of fronting Its A Sin has matured Alexanders lyrical point-of-view. Songs such as the stand-outs Immaculate and Make It Out Alive meditate on the experiences of hedonism and sex through a knowing lens of consequence and danger. On Communion and Palo Santo, elements of sexuality often felt like extraneous interludes of titillation.

Here, Alexander is palpably aware that his community of LGBTQ+ people are now paying close attention. The margin for getting it wrong with a misstep is smaller, and hints of timidity can be felt on the notably self-conscious tracks Sweet Talker and Crave, both of which employ empty-calorie clichs instead of the primal seduction that both songs imply. That said, when he gets it right, as he does on Reflections, with its cynical negotiation of a one-night stand, Alexander proves his skill as a writer and vocalist of formidable power.

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Years & Years, Night Call, review: Olly Alexander turns the hedonism up loud - Telegraph.co.uk