Sean Solomon - The World Is Not Good Enough

While not judging a book - or, in this case, a record - by its cover is an adage well used for good reason, in this case, that of Los Angeles singer-songwriter and animator Sean Solomon’s debut ‘The World Is Not Good Enough’, his illustration does a pretty good job. At first glance, it’s a cutesy ode to timeless children’s picture books; on closer look, a far more satirical take on the style - see its coffee-guzzling elephant, dog painting a scantily-clad woman, or man perched on the edge of a roof, anxious gaze downward to the busy street. Similarly, the singer’s musical style is wholly nice - take the breezy guitars and twinkling piano of ‘Remember’, or the classic, ‘70s warmth of ‘Finish Line’ as cases in point - but is paired with a distinctive vocal style that’s simultaneously sweet and pained, weaving tales of a darkness beneath, often with unexpected poignancy.

This all combines wonderfully on the expansive ‘Shooting Star’, where brass pipes up to add an unexpected euphoria among lines like “She wanted to die / But wore a seatbelt”, and the stripped-back ‘Blackhole’, its resigned “You don’t have to love me too” a particularly poignant gut-punch. The record’s title - as repeated throughout ‘Finish Line’ - also offers an emotional heft, its resigned sigh as wistful as it’s possible to get. It’s a shame, then, that ‘Postcard’ sticks out for its use of things a little more obvious: the rhyme of “bad news” with “nothing left to lose”; the Tumblr-esque melodrama of “Tell me why / I have to die / To remember that I’m alive” on an otherwise nondescript track. But, for the most part, ‘The World Is Not Good Enough’ is, yes, as wholly pleasant as its colourful, cute-adjacent cover would suggest.