Behind the tenderness of teenage love that fills the five breakthrough tracks of Fred Roberts’ impressive debut EP is a whole lot of catharsis.
The 21-year-old is willing to love and to hurt on Sound of My Youth, which makes for a compelling listen and an effort that couldn’t sound further from a rising star taking his first steps.
Anyone who asks Roberts of his inspiration will immediately be told it’s Troye Sivan. Like any queer Gen Z adolescent, it was Sivan’s Blue Neighbourhood trilogy that marked a turning point for the budding singer.
Those influences are still plain to hear nine years on and it’s not too ambitious to liken Sound of My Youth to the Australian’s coming-of-age release.
The EP kicks off on the thudding ‘Runaway’. A full-blooded recounting of bumping into an ex at the bar, Roberts takes a deep breath and opts for fight over flight. “People change, I have changed,” he chants.
The Chorleywood-raised songwriter keeps the pop-rock production of ‘Runaway’ high for follow-up single ‘Say’. For fans of Phoebe Bridgers, Olivia Rodrigo and Nieve Ella, it’s a surefire winner.
On that track, Roberts struggles between desire and self-sabotage – “when I first felt desired by a boy, I clung onto that feeling, as I feared if I were to let go, it would never happen again,” he said on release. It’s an arena-sized flick that is a highlight of the star’s live set.
Where ‘Runaway’ and ‘Say’ saw the singer burst onto the scene over radio-ready hits, the most extraordinary moments on Sound of My Youth come in its emotional bedroom confessions.
Emotional sucker-punch ‘Disguise’ is so clever in its simple storytelling that it prompted revered SiriusXM host Larry Flick to pen a Substack essay on a first love he hadn’t dared share before.
The track stories Roberts’ experience being kept as a secret by a partner not ready to make their relationship public. “Do I wish that I was somebody else, someone that you don’t need to hide?” the singer croons.
Above all, it’s Roberts’ songwriting that makes his debut EP so convincing. There’s something very Taylor Swift in the detail of the dark cinema rooms of ‘Disguise’ and there’s more where that came from on EP highlight ‘Naive’.
Listeners are taken to a backyard trampoline under the stars as Roberts reflects on the innocence of first love. It’s a heartbreaking ballad whose tender guitar lets the singer’s vocals take centre stage.
‘Naive’ is the EP at its saddest but in Roberts’ frustrated calls of ‘how could I be so naive?’ is a willingness to feel every inch of the heartbreak.
That’s the triumph in Sound of My Youth. What is, essentially, a heartbreak EP is delivered with such a commitment to the emotion that it’s a cathartic listen – and that feeling comes to a head on the title track finale.
A flick fit to soundtrack the iconic tunnel scene of The Perks of Being A Wallflower, Roberts admits that “after everything, I’m still dancing to the sound of my youth”. It’s a track to roll down the windows and crank up the speakers as it brings the EP to a close. And then press repeat.