Jack Jones: Jack Jones – Album Review

Trampolene frontman Jack Jones goes it alone and ditches his guitar for a debut album that’s a refreshing surprise and a ‘hooked on first listen’ affair reckons Wayne AF Carey…

Here’s the PR bumph with added AF:

Having established himself as a guitar slinging matinee idol fronting Welsh riot starters Trampolene  and riding shotgun in Peter Doherty’s band the Puta Madres, Jack Jones releases an excellent debut, far away from his usual sound. This new direction arose out of an introduction to Mancunian artist/producer/songwriter/laptop warrior Adam French. For Jones, French’s way of composing and recording was like being teleported into a parallel dimension.

Jack Jones is a compulsive wordsmith, an obsessive jotter-down of phrases, and weird things that people say. Across three studio albums and a hatful of singles and EPs since 2013, his work with TRAMPOLENE has always drawn from this humungous, ever-accumulating verbal resource. On his own, he has also published a novel (2023’s ‘Swansea to Hornsey’) and recited poems and delivered spoken-word onstage.

For this album Jack Jones has put away his guitar and embraced a fresh and highly contemporary sound in which to couch his hard-hitting state of the nation poems of existential fear and loathing. His lyrics tackle many of today’s burning issues: mental health, drug. addiction, mortality, and the tortuous demands of technology. There’s also joy and hope in  there. With some of his catchiest tunes so far, it’s a record that’ll both open up this natural-born start on tapped audiences, and reveal hidden depths to those already ‘on the team’.

Opening track make it so Make It So is a strong start with his unique Welsh accented spoken word telling the tale of working through Covid with his partner a nurse and the habits of trying to be clean and pure, getting OCD about handwashing and changing clothes. It’s a trip hop start with some great vocals flowing with the soft spoken words. Breath delves into past addiction and starts with dark keyboards and a hip pop beat floating into a dark chorus with somehow reminds of Fontaines DC’s Starburster. Dark Hip Hop Funk anyone? Gladys is a track about a therapist and also the name of Peter Doherty’s dog (another story within the song!) A funky number that lifts the mood and gives out a dancefloor vibe with a cracking chorus.

The thing about Jack Jones is he’s going for the killer chorus on every track here. Peaches Out Of Reach is another dancefloor banger about addiction and dreaming of going back to being a child – “Get me back to Gameboys and water slides” says it all. “Maybe I should have died young”. Sounds grim but it’s a great listen. The Mountains (You & I) is a personal tune with a great beat and chorus again, telling the story of going into detox in a Buddhist monastery and coming out of the other end. Every track tell’s a great story with some top as fuck beats that keep you hooked. Who Let The Bass Pump Through The Floor is a techno banger with some of the best lyrics going, describing a delinquent house party and the residents from each house on the street crashing in. “Disco Hugh from number two’s, moonwalking through my living room, he’s body popping mega moves” A highlight. It’s just another rainy day in South Wales.

The tunes keep coming with the brilliant MDMA Day which is the modern equivalent of Blinded By The Lights by The Streets, all about the rush of ecstacy and how you feel on the high, then how you feel fuckin’ shite the next day. A stark warning to the kids of today as it’s still rife at festivals and Jack even goes to rename Glastonbury ‘MDMA-bury’. Dumb Phone is a fast paced dark hip hop rant about the evils of mobile phones. The chorus is fuckin’ brilliant and the lyrics are absolutely funny as fuck yet so true. The evils of social media wrapped in a little piece of plastic and metal.

What You Waiting For is just beautiful. This is where Jack bears his soul about using technology as he explains here: “This one is a case where the singing is very different for me on this album. Usually I’m used to getting in front of a microphone and singing as loud as I can, but on this one there are lots of harmonies, and lots of different singing techniques, which Adam challenged me with. Like there are these big vibrato-y ad-libbing singing parts towards the end of the choruses, and some of it has this really gentle, soft Billie Eilish-style singing which was totally fucking alien to me”.

Let Down is probably the track that would be massive in the pop world if the chorus of “It’s such a fucking let down” was changed for the BBC sheep that run the daytime schedules. The earworm of the album, funky as fuck with a massive Massive Attack type beat and yes, all about being let down. Closing track Love & Tears is a lament to Jack’s late Grandmother and it’s a sad yet uplifting piece of modern Trip Hop Soul that tears at your heart. Warped vocoder vocals that could be compared to some of the greats in the modern hip hop sounds of these times.

Mike Skinner has made a bit of a comeback recently yet he needs to be scared as Jack Jones and his sidekick Adam French have released a classic here that takes elements from the past, creates euphoric bridges and choruses and slams right through the heart of many artists with a spark of genius. This takes me right back to the first time I heard Original Pirate Material blasting from every car stereo in Manchester back in 2002. Another album of the year.

Jack Jones will be playing the following headline shows in November:

NOVEMBER
2nd SAT Glasgow – The Poetry Club SWG3
3rd SUN Liverpool – Jacaranda
6th WED North Shields – Three Tanners Bank
7th THU Manchester – YES Basement
8th FRI Cambridge – The Six Six Bar
9th SAT Shrewsbury – Albert & Co Frankville
13th WED Bristol – The Exchange
14th THU London – Old Blue Last
15th FRI Swansea – Bunkhouse
16th SAT Cardiff – The Moon

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Words by Wayne Carey, Reviews Editor for Louder Than War. His author profile is here