Colleen Green - Cool

The last time Colleen Green put a record out, she was facing up to turning thirty, and it showed. ‘I Want to Grow Up’ was an album that was superficially in the image she’d crafted on previous albums ‘Milo Goes to Compton’ and ‘Sock It to Me’ - sardonic lyricism, ironic detachment - but beneath the surface, there was genuine angst. What was she doing with her life? Where was all of this leading? Over the course of an extended lay-off - this is her first new album in six years - she seems to have found some answers. ‘Cool’ is a gorgeously breezy collection that drills down into life’s fundamentals on the upbeat, handsomely melodic likes of ‘Posi Vibes’ and ‘It’s Nice to Be Nice’. Opener ‘Someone Else’, meanwhile, might be the standout, pairing nineties college rock guitars with languid, almost conversational vocals that have Colleen letting go of constant self-comparison. Hints of her last album’s emotional tumult remain - ‘Highway’ is a case in point - but in the main, ‘Cool’’s sharp pop unfolds with a satisfying lightness of touch. Colleen Green has always been cool. It’s just that she seems content now, too.