Two years on it's fashionable to loathe 'You're Beautiful' - but it was a genius pop moment (women are a sucker for a man stripped emotionally and physically naked because it happens so rarely). Since then of course Blunt has emerged as a Casanova with the ladies. So how to recapture that original raw innocence - and worldwide sales of 14 million - with the tricky second album?
Blunt opts for an open-hearted 1970s vibe. New single '1973' samples Cat Stevens and James Taylor, and is utterly addictive. You can just see girls in loon trousers shimmering past on Space Hoppers. Actually, it was written and mixed at his rock-star pad in Ibiza, and Blunt wasn't born until 1974, but don't let a little fact like history worry you.
Certainly Blunt captures the era brilliantly, from the dissonant guitar chords to the curly-wurly typography on the album cover. The anthemic 'Shine On' is exquisitely crafted while 'I Can't Hear the Music' hooks into your brain with its James Bond-style orchestration.
Of course this is Seventies-lite without any of the politics and sense of social unrest. But it's impossible to resist Blunt's troubadour yearning. He is on record as saying his music is the clumsy public schoolboy's attempt at communication. At least he's trying.
And there are darker moments on All the Lost Souls. 'Shine On' turns out to be a desperate invocation to shut out the world's media, while 'Annie' is a wry take on a celebrity girlfriend who sells her story ('Annie, you're a star, it's just not going very far'). Blunt-baiters are never going to be convinced, of course. And occasionally he does tip over into Gilbert O'Sullivan petulance (the grandstanding 'One of the Brightest Stars'). But snobbery apart, this is a terrific album.
Download: '1973'; 'Shine On'
