Album Review: Jake Bugg - Shangri-La

Nottingham's Jake Bugg is turning into quite the prolific singer/songwriter. Barely a year on from his Mercury Prize-nominated debut, the 19-year-old returns with Shangri-La.

Despite this album having been recorded in Malibu with super producer Rick Rubin, Bugg's colours remain unchanged. There's a fuller production sound, Messed Up Kids filled out with electric guitars and strong percussion to match Bugg's braying “It's a washed out Saturday” as he paints a story of lower-class struggle characterised by drug-dealing buddies and girls out on the streets. The songs are endlessly catchy: opener, There's A Beast And We All Feed It, is classic country, all lilting guitar and snare undertone. Slumville Sunrise will be familiar to anyone who saw Bugg on tour recently, he's been pulling it out in live shows and slots easily into his repertoire, with a chugging riff and tongue-twister lyrics that speed up exponentially as Bugg's energy grows.

The slow tempo songs are hit and miss – A Song About Love teeters on saccharine but saves itself with wide-eyed innocence; All Your Reasons, meanwhile, screams Neil Young tribute. Bugg sings of what he knows – childhood council housing life, wheeling and dealing friends, the girls he's convinced to love and then left. He has an admitted tendency to lean on cliché; one of the best songs, What Doesn't Kill You, is the epitome of underdog anthem. Yet Jake Bugg possesses the powerful talent of singing with a natural conviction and not coming off precocious.