Tom Grennan – Lighting Matches Album Review

Track List

Found What I’ve Been Looking For
Royal Highness
Barbed Wire
Run in the Rain
Aboard
Lighting Matches
Lucky Ones
Sober
I Might
Make ’em Like You
Something in the Water
Little By Little Love

23 year old British singer-songwriter Tom Grennan’s debut album is quite the impressive feat. Although some of the tracks do suffer from an overly simplistic chorus, there’s enough originality blended with Tom’s unique voice to make this Indie Pop album well worth listening to.

The album begins with the infectiously catchy Found What I’ve Been Looking For before rolling confidently into the other 11 tracks that all compliment one another while bringing the vocals to centre stage. There’s a real swagger to Tom’s voice too and the reassured, confident tonal shifts in his vocal range are really quite impressive. There’s a harmonious blend with the catchy instrumental beats of each song too and whether it be a simple guitar riff or more dominant chord-heavy songs, Tom’s vocal shines through and works perfectly with each instrumental backing track.

It’s really quite impressive too knowing this young man is only 23. There’s a real understanding of track composition and how to produce a catchy record at play here and although a lot of the choruses rely heavily on repeating a stock phrase again and again, most of the verses have a decent amount of work put into them in terms of pacing and lyrical content to keep each song fresh and original. Of course, each person is going to have a different track that resonates with them the most but as a personal favourite, Found What I’ve Been Looking For is our favourite, working well to emphasise Tom’s swagger and confidence while delivering one heck of a catchy hook in the process.

As a debut pop album, Tom Grennan absolutely delivers and the distinct album sleeve works perfectly with the bold, red outline and black and white stock photo. While quite a few choruses do rely on the usual hook of repeating the same stock phrase again and again, there’s a great range of instruments, vocals and lyrical content in each track to make this one a uniquely appealing pop album. How well this does in the mainstream is anyone’s guess but with a chart chock full of auto-tune, rap and watered down EDM, Tom Grennan could just be the Indie Pop voice needed to bring some much needed variety.