#491: Harry’s House (Harry Styles, 2022)

Wow, Rolling Stone really loves Harry Styles. At least with the 2023 update they managed to resist adding an album with currently charting singles! Styles has always leaned into being critic-bait - he dresses like David Bowie and names his album after a Joni Mitchell song - and the potential for a boy band member to become a serious artiste is catnip to music fans and publications alike. Actually I lied earlier. This record is actually named after a ‘70s Japanese city pop album named Hosono House. That's probably why this record sounds less like singer-songwriter folk and more like new wave with light disco and funk influences, which I guess is a decent approximation of city pop. Highlights of the album include the so-bad-it's-good aesthetically-incoherent Music for a Sushi Restaurant, the late era Strokes pastiche As it Was and Little Freak with its viscous vocal effects. I don't have much to say about the rest of the album - I like the guitars on Daylight but I thought Matilda was too boring for words - but I'm still waiting for a Styles’ album that lives up to the hype. 2.9/5.