Album review: Wolf Gang, Suego Faults

Wolf Gang: Suego Faults

Atlantic, 10.99 ****

BEFORE dropping out of this course at the London School of Economics to become a pop star called Wolf Gang, Max McElligott was writing a thesis which inquired Is The Notion of Romanticism a Western Construct? But he failed to complete his dissertation, distracted understandably by the very real possibility that he might succeed in making a living as a musician instead.

It is too early to say if McElligott's upbeat, fizzy tunes will stick in a way that his studies didn't. Already on his debut album there is evidence that his grand schemes have a habit of fizzling out, that he tends to give up on a song once he has established a central hookline and attached some glitzy decoration. There's no digging deep into the emotional well, no sense of hunger, no need for catharsis. But there are irresistible tunes aplenty, pinched from classic sources and polished for instant appeal. As shiny musical baubles go, Suego Faults is pretty dazzling.

McElligott is a maximalist one-man band. The background notes say he is the son of a history professor and a classical violinist. His gypsy childhood included stints in Ann Arbor and the village of Strathkinness, not far from St Andrews, where he enjoyed a formative musical experience playing in a pipe band. He took up piano, then drums, later guitar, but never seriously considered following in his mother's footsteps as a professional musician until others heard his potential.

As Wolf Gang, he has been signed for a couple of years, and afforded the luxury of time to work on his debut album with esteemed producer Dave Fridmann, whose work with US indie sensations MGMT Suego Faults closely resembles. The good news is that Wolf Gang repays his paymasters' faith in his pop promise. He thieves incorrigibly from some of the 1970s pop greats, standing shoulder to shoulder with other pop magpies such as Mika and Scissor Sisters in his ability to pen a gleaming chorus.

This is no tentative toe in the water, but an epicurean wallow in all that the pop playground has to offer – nice work if you can get it.

Like Marina & the Diamonds and Florence & the Machine before him, McElligott has been seduced by the studio. He's got choruses, he's got middle eights, he's got access to Fridmann's many musical toys, he's got 48 tracks and he's gonna fill them. If he gets the chance to make another album, he can go all minimalist and considered then. For now he is having too much fun chucking ingredients into the stew.

Lions In Cages kicks things off with a simple, contagious synth hookline, its tale of young hearts running free through the city delivered in the slightly whiny, reedy indie vocal style de jour. The innocent, twinkle of Something Unusual is lifted by a pretty, aqueous synth sound and a hint of Afrobeat guitar. The ravishing, regretful Back To Back sounds like a lost MGMT single, though it would have been just as, if not more effective at half the length.

Exercising his foppishly combative streak – us against the world, baby – on the anthemic pop number Stay And Defend, it becomes clear that he shares more than part of his moniker with Patrick Wolf, though he doesn't yet radiate the charisma nor command the same adoration as his namesake.

He continues to man the pop battle stations on the similarly Wolfish single The King and All Of His Men, mowing down the listener with his inexorable synth pop advance. If the "ooh-ooh" hookline doesn't get you, the wall of keyboards will.

The sweeping 1970s piano ballad Midnight Dancers is replete with swooning vocals, twinkling keyboards and tastefully fuzzy glam guitars but stops short of the full orchestral blowout. Fridmann's previous form in this area, notably Mercury Rev's Deserters Songs, is invoked on the title track. The name Suego Faults came to McElligott in a dream – how else? – conjuring up images of a small town in the backwoods of New England… sorry, a utopian dreamworld with its resonant piano, chiming keyboards and choral backing vocals.

There is time to throw in another couple of fine radio pop choruses, Where Are You Now and the glam tizzy of Dancing With The Devil, before ending with the would-be epic flourish of Planets. Like every other track on this album, it's an accomplished stab at someone else's territory – Bowie/Nilsson-style bombastic balladry, in this case – which just misses out on greatness but is worth surrendering to all the same.

Think of Suego Faults as a whirlwind fling, an album that is so now, you should hear it today. The only question is will you still love Wolf Gang tomorrow?