Sam Fender - Hypersonic Missiles (Album Review)

After two years of steadily increasing his fanbase, Sam Fender's consistent output has lead to the most crucial moment in his career thus far: the make or break moment of his debut album; whether he could capitalise on the success of a few singles and make for the mainstream all whilst retaining his usual knack for excellent, Springsteen-influenced tunes and conscious, provocative lyrics. It's been over a year since my initial discovery of Sam with the underrated single "Dead Boys", a track that thankfully makes it onto here, and with every subsequent single my concerns around this release only grew. My anticipation was most notably shrouded in disappointment in regards to the title track and its confused muddle of directional overcrowding. It's lack of singular focus works against it as the writing feels crammed in and forced, a rather common flaw in many of Sam's singles. His blatant, unsubtle lyrics may be the driving force between his popularity with his younger audience, but the lingering pretentious presence is often the primary reason for me not getting behind so many of his songs, and is likely why I am still now most drawn to the simplicity and emotion of "Dead Boys", in my opinion potentially his best song.

It is hard to write a song that's both catchy and meaningful, a fact displayed rather a lot in the past couple of years with Childish Gambino's "This Is America" and The Killers' recent "Land Of The Free", both songs that struggle without their respective videos to effectively capture their meaning whilst also attaining a strong hook. In the case of Sam Fender, this balance has been the pivotal point on nearly every song he's released, with so many failing to convey both features effectively and thus resulting in a lot of very mixed singles I've found myself torn on, either because I enjoy the lyrical themes and content but find it forgettable and instrumentally underweight or vice versa. This was a trend that continued into the flawed Dead Boys EP, a project I hardly came back to aside from a couple of songs. Nevertheless, I tried to go into this album as unbiased as I could, still curious to see what Sam Fender could bring on his first full-length release...

Hypersonic Missiles is definitely a mixed bag, rife with imperfections and yet it is perhaps the most empathetic display of songwriting all year and a rather charming effort into our socio political climate, centring on the strife surrounding his connections and relationships in a world so chaotic and unprogressive. None of this is original and due to how topical these themes are today it's easy to see how Sam could be overlooked as just another young person begging for change and calling out the "unspoken" crimes that plague our society but I'd argue his melancholic, groovy callback to 80s pre-indie rock is exactly what we need in 2019. His idol, Bruce Springsteen, is obviously a huge influence on this album and whilst an obvious criticism would be that this unoriginality and retread of very much outdated musical ideas makes his music uninteresting, I would argue that his confident roots in one area makes for a stronger foundation on which he lays down some of his strongest instrumentals and most memorable choruses to date. He still falls into the habit of sometimes saying too much but there is a good set of tracks that manage to stick to their message and establish their purpose without wandering astray and getting caught up in that lyrically overcrowded state that does plague the title track.

After that title track comes the album's longest and I suppose most grand moment, the euphoric "The Borders", a narrative, chorus-less outing that immediately showcases the major improvements to Sam's songwriting. He's able to convey the emotion of a fractured friendship with (for once) relevant details and the best example of a louder, leading guitar that I'd heard him perform. The tone is perfect and whilst it does run a bit long it's a great example of his talents that should have really been the album's opener. What comes next is the song that made me realise I should be taking him seriously. "White Privilege" is, lyrically, the most intelligent and proficient song on the album and I have a tonne of respect for what he's saying. I relate completely to his position and I appreciate how precise his words are, I believe it works essentially as a piece of poetry or a sort of impassioned speech, but as a song... it is the worst track on the album, it's more folk-rock instrumental delivering some of the weakest melodies and most repetitive and uninteresting rhythms of his career. Regardless of this, it's a relevant moment of commendable writing that would work better as a standalone piece of social commentary, as it breaks up an otherwise smooth album.

In terms of highlights on this album, the best moments often come in the form of saxophone solos to provide a climax to a few of the songs, the best of which is on the haunting, wintery "You're Not the Only One", an undeniable standout and favourite of mine. Around the middle of the album, Sam is at his most bold and the three most powerfully upbeat tunes (That Sound; Saturday & Will We Talk?) present a different side to Fender, and a more garage rock and 90s indie rock sound comes into play, particularly on the first and third songs. To be honest, despite my initial indifference on the track, it's great to see how successful "Will We Talk?" has become and how close it got to crack the Top 40. It'd be great to see this stick around, the charts need a song as good as this to push as an alternative to Catfish & The Bottlemen, as it's far from just the cheap replicas of past songs and riffs that that band brings. I can hear some of The Strokes' "Hard To Explain" in aspects of "Will We Talk?", but it doesn't resort to ripping it off or copying. It's takes a similar rhythm and constructs a completely different song around it. Tangent over.

Overall, this is a pretty great album that sees Sam Fender develop his sound into a more distinctive and (usually) coherent way. Aside from a couple of outright blunders, the imperfections seem to add to the strong charisma these songs have. Moreover, his vocals are the best they've ever been, soaring over some engaging riffs and memorable melodies. It flows really well, and the production helps contribute to its retro stylings without it sounding dated or too lost in the past, giving it a timeless quality that this could very well keep given its success so far. It's a solid debut and the selection of songs is excellent, generally exceeding the previous, non-album singles. From me, Hypersonic Missiles gets a strong 7 out of 10, and I highly recommend checking it out.

Best Songs: Dead Boys; You're Not the Only One; Call Me Lover; Will We Talk?; The Borders

Worst Songs: White Privilege; Hypersonic Missiles; Saturday

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"Hypersonic Missiles"

Sam Fender
13/09/2019

Polydor Records/Interscope

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