Jamie Cullum: Twentysomething : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

In the punch-line-filled verses of the title track to Jamie Cullum's Twentysomething, the British singer and pianist laments the sheer folly of his expensive education. Over a snazzy Afro-jazz groove, Cullum ponders whether he should move back home and "work nine-to-five, answering phones," before he utters an outright plea: "Don't make me live for my Friday nights/Drinking eight pints and getting in fights." It's modern disillusionment expressed in the language of the relentlessly chipper ring-a-ding-ding Fifties, and Cullum, 24, cops the perfect croon to put it across. Elsewhere on this thoroughly enjoyable (if slightly too long) album, Cullum uses material from several pop eras to showcase his slippery-eel vocal phrasing, completely rearranging classic pop standards and bringing a wry invention to Jeff Buckley's "Lover, You Should've Come Over." And on his own "All at Sea," Cullum delivers a heroic sense of romantic longing - the kind that once saturated Van Morrison's songs, before he became a grouch.