Charlie wants every listener to feel like they wrote this album with him, but instead of a collective effort, CHARLIE sounds like a gaggle of dilettante lovers fumbling their various shots at getting the guurl. What would an attempt at turning someone on ‘like a light switch’ look like? This record is suspended in a sickening, Nickelodeon-esque fantasy bolstered by its 30-year-old maker’s creepy infantilism. It would miss every boat in a game of emotional battleship. Puth is a soldier of his own talent and the lucrative music business: he does what he is told by a horrifyingly successful mix of the two.
6/30
A favourite: ‘No More Drama’
‘CHARLIE’ is out now via Atlantic.
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