Jack Penate – Everything Is New (XL Recordings)
The title is bullshit: this is straight up UK pop that would fit snuggly in between your ABC and Paul Young singles, albeit with a less refined take on pale white soul. But give the boy a little time—he was just a gleam in his dad’s eye when Young’s No Parlez was released—and give him a few more records to fill out his collection, because Jack Penate is eating up influences like Andy Clark ate a shitload of sandwiches for lunch in The Breakfast Club.
Everything Is New is Penate’s second effort, and he is already taking listeners to places that even he has never explored. Sounds of Cuba, Brazil, Nigeria, as well as regions of the U.S. are visited within the nine tracks, and don’t believe for a minute that this youngster went into these sessions with such a worldview in mind. If anything, credit this travel itinerary to producer Paul Epworth.