Alfie Templeman
roars into his full-length debut with a head of steam and a surprisingly prolific back catalog of popular singles and EPs. Signed to London's
Chess Club
label at the age of 15, the Bedfordshire native spent the next few years honing his fizzy, multi-hued bedroom pop and tapping the zeitgeist of youth with irrepressibly catchy songs like "Everybody's Gonna Love Somebody" and "Happiness in Liquid Form." His affable, good-natured personality belies the preternatural skills he flashes in his home studio, where he writes, sings, produces, and plays nearly all of the instruments on his recordings. Like a teenaged
Todd Rundgren
, whom he cites as an influence,
Templeman
is something of a creative multi-tool who lets his music speak for itself. After ramping up with the 2021 mini-album
Forever Isn't Long Enough
, the rather lengthy
Mellow Moon
stands as his first long-form statement. Among layers of liquid guitar licks, shimmering synths, and percussion,
's rangy voice gets a little deeper into the weeds, bringing listeners in on his journey so far. Whether relating his fears and anxieties against the effervescent backdrop of "Broken" or examining a new love on "3D Feelings," he's at his best when pairing clean pop hooks with an innate sense of honesty. Another standout, the hooky "Folding Mountains," is a slick little gem of quirky samples that highlights his sense of craft and pop smarts. There are stumbles too. Brought up on a steady diet of singles,
has some trouble stringing together a substantive 14-track set and a number of the cuts simply coast along on groove and tone without much else to recommend them. Minus the filler and occasional bouts of clumsy wordplay,
does little to damage the young singer/songwriter's reputation and adds a clutch of well-made tracks to his growing canon. ~ Timothy Monger