Hi, everyone. Dancethony Movetano here, the internet's busiest music nerd. It's time for a review of this new Harry Styles album, Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally.

This is the newest, fourth, and weirdly titled new full-length record from pop singer and songwriter, Mr. Harry Styles, who honestly I have been awaiting the return of. Because as unimpressed as I personally have been with a lot of Harry's solo output over the years, I can't really deny that he has had the most cultural and commercial impact of any member from his former band trying to go solo.

Frankly, the male pop meta has been absolutely boring in the past few years that Harry has been MIA. Like, Benson Boon backflips? Justin Bieber being made interesting by Dijon? Bruno Mars proving he's the less interesting half of Silk Sonic? The Kid LAROI embarrassing himself over a woman who's not even interested in him? The Weeknd, who put out a great album but had to follow it up with a terrible movie? And Sombr, who has growth potential for sure, but it needs work. The void of anything interesting has been so wide and open, even MGK jumped into it with his last record.

So, Harrison Styles, please save us.

However, going into this record, I was wondering if Harry was actually plotting a pop takeover here because he seems to be more focused on what this new era is going to do for him artistically, as each record from Harry so far has had its own distinct personality and direction, with him proving his songwriting chops on a very straightforward debut, then giving us the pop rock bliss of 2019's Fine Line, which had a lot of anthems on it. Then following that in 2022 with Harry's House, he took things in more of an alternative direction.

Now, as if it wasn't already obvious, Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally., (the last time I will be saying that album title in full in this review) – this project is a lot more preoccupied with dance music, though don't expect much disco from it. So yeah, while this album is most definitely more of a dance record for Harry, the songs here also see him continuing to make some really obvious nods toward artists on the indie circuit that, frankly, do whatever he is attempting here much better. And I'm not even talking about Harry shouting out artists like LCD Soundsystem, for example, as a point of inspiration. I mean, I could only hope.

There was also this recent little live performance where he was dressed up and doing some big group choreo in a fashion that very much read like I don't know, some David Byrne or Talking Heads type stuff, which, yeah, was encouraging. B

ut actually, I was a lot more shocked listening to this album at how brazen Harry is about borrowing so many different vocal mannerisms from Ezra Koenig of Vampire Weekend fame to the point where it's actually uncanny, not only in the way that Harry layers his vocals on this record, but also he even limits his vocal range a little bit to fit into Ezra's boyish gentle singing style. Like the track "Taste Back", for example, sounds like a synth-only Vampire Weekend demo, the thing the band would lay down to tape just to get the song structured before they add in all of the little broke and worldly pop elements that actually make the song fun to listen to.

So yeah, in that respect, there are just a lot of songs on this LP, frankly, that are so clearly derivative. Harry has marketed himself to be too plugged in to plead ignorance here, as if he's completely unaware of indie music's biggest Ivy Leaguers.

But with that being said, an even bigger disappointment with this project is just how broadly unadventurous it is on the dance music front. This is not a deep dive into dance music, any style of dance music, really. If anything, Harry is only willing to wade in the waters up to his knees here.

For sure, I know the lead single, "Aperture", was a risk given its slow pacing, its linear progression. It's not a smash single for sure, nor is it trying to be. I also wouldn't really expect this track's wallpaper beats and faint knob twisting to light up the dance floor anytime soon. However, the track is also just the start of this record, and maybe it's Harry's intentions to ease us into discoing occasionally. But the thing is this album doesn't get much bolder as we go further into it, sadly.

We have, for example, "American Girls", which is not a bad tune at its core, though the American girls subject matter feels more like pandering than poeticism. It really feels like a song that could have been on Fine Line spiritually, but its bass and guitars are swapped out with keys and synth bass.

This album doesn't really gain a pulse until we hit "Ready, Steady, Go!" which has much snappier, crispier drums, a boxy bass line, all of which explode into this wall of siren synths and distorted lead vocals on the chorus. The end result is not hanging in the red or anything like that. It's a little middle of the road, but still a step in the right direction. That is if we are getting a dance-oriented album here.

Following this, we have "Are You Listening Yet?", which, of course, features talk singing, which is just so in vogue right now. This is also handily one of the most layered tracks on the record. Features a lot of polyrhythms, a wailing guitar solo, some group harmony layers. It's got a real larger than life feel, but simultaneously there's very little live or musical chemistry going on between any of the instrumentation here. So the peak it eventually reaches does come off a bit sterile, almost like Harry and company are afraid to make the record sound too wild or crazy. I feel like I'm standing in the center of one of those coffee raves I hear everyone talking about on TikTok.

This is also one of the tracks on the record that sticks out to me lyrically for all the wrong reasons. "Don't blink or mix the medium / you're smarter than that / This world is screaming, so you start to scream right / This unpredictable fun is fun if you know how / If you must join a movement, make sure there's dancing." These are, honestly, Cat in the Hat-ass bars.

Sadly, though, this grandiose peak the album has reached is very short-lived as things start to get stripped back pretty quickly on "The Waiting Game", which is a straight up acoustic crooner with some dreamy synths and laid back drum loops. And honestly, as chill as this track is, it's maybe the first song I'm fully sold on in this tracklist. The chord progression is tasty, and lyrically speaking, it's genuinely heart-wrenching at points: "You found someone to put your arms around / playing the waiting game / but it all adds up to nothing." Harry's super chill, quiet, intimate lead vocals, which are mic'd super close, are a nice touch too. But again, for a song this low-key to sound much better than everything thus far does not bode well for the rest of this album's dance-oriented cuts.

Case in point, the track "Season 2 Weight Loss". A title that makes the album's title look good. But also the intro to this track sounds like some random IDM cut with its angular synth licks and stuttering snare embellishments. It's like Harry Styles is trying to fit some Obama-era indie hopecore anthem over an Aphex Twin ambient work. And honestly, that is not a combination I am interested in, in the slightest.

"Coming up Roses", though, is another solid low-key ballad in the tracklist. And then "Pop" is, at least to me, like, the album's "Watermelon Sugar". It is one of the catchiest tracks on the record and a very suggestive spending time with that special someone type jam. It really is the bop I am most pleased with on the record, though I will say it's more by virtue of the song writing than the so-so synth work that the production offers here.

Then there's "Dance No More", which is definitely a change of pace. It's a sleek, '80s-inspired funk jam, à la Nile Rogers or maybe even Mark Ronson's "Uptown Funk", but like, boneless. And while the song does have some decent bass licks and rhythm guitars to be had, it lands in unintentionally hilarious territory with this big group chorus, shouty bit on the bridge, where Harry and company are all yelling, "Get your feet wet / Teach them all to respect their mother." I'm sorry. He even ends it all off with, "Be a good girl, go get it, fox." Like he's trying to put some stank on it, but it's not quite there.

Last song I want to point out is "Carla's Song" at the very end of the album, which pretty much sounds like a Future Islands track, but without the dazzling production and, of course, the intense and expressive lead vocals that actually hook you into the band's tunes.

Yeah, unfortunately, this record is just missing a lot of things. It's missing a lot of things. It's missing quality songwriting, at least on most of its tracks. It's missing a cohesive direction. It's missing interesting production. It's missing a personality, a personality, but also an identity, because for a bulk of this project's run time, Harry is just giving us the most boring and unimaginative spin on some of the most innovative and genuinely interesting artists in the mid-range underground, popular indie circuit, as it were. Certainly not bad artists to pull inspiration from in concept, but Harry doesn't do anything with this inspiration at any time that rises above boring pastiche.

Also, it should be noted that in the greater context of dance music and electronic music right now, really interesting, exciting things are going on all the time between producers and DJs, between pop singers and writers and all the new interesting tech out there when it comes to creating and generating any sound you could possibly conceive of.

None of that shows up on this record at all, like in any form or fashion. Like, dance music and electronic music, respectively, are really vibrant scenes right now. And Harry couldn't possibly sound more unplugged from all of it on this record, which is why I'm feeling like a light four on this album.

Anthony Fantano. Harry Styles. Forever.