When Matty Healy of The 1975 supported Phoebe Bridgers at a gig in 2021, he played a plaintive acoustic folk tune called New York. The song, he later revealed, was not an unreleased track by his band but one belonging to his friend Benjamin Francis Leftwich. It may be the closest Leftwich comes to an international hit.
The York-born musician’s early material earned comparisons to acts such as Damien Rice, yet while his fifth album is billed as a subtle reinvention. it doesn’t sound as though much has changed since his 2011 debut.
The addition of orchestration on the piano ballad Moon Landing Hoax adds a vaguely dramatic undertow, and the propulsive 1980s pop beat of God’s Best harkens back to the aforementioned 1975.
Otherwise, this is mostly tender folk pop riddled with eye-rolling lyrical platitudes such as “Won’t give up on you, don’t give up on me/ If you’re hurting now, you won’t always be.”
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The clear outlier is Spokane, Washington, a song that hints at the songwriter Leftwich could be if he managed to shake off the cliches. A tribute to his late father in the form of a musical open letter, it is both heartfelt and evocative, with lines such as “Late night at the station after Burger King is closed/ I wander ’round in circles, imagining your ghost.”
That said, there is nothing particularly new or inspiring amid this rather ordinary collection.
