The Wanted for those who don’t know, are a British pop boy band based in London and comprises of Max George, Siva Kaneswaran, Jay McGuiness and Nathan Sykes. Tom Parker, who was also part of the band, passed away due to cancer in 2022.

The four lads are visiting Mumbai for a live show organised by KCT Entertainment on Friday 17^th May 2024 at Dublin Square, Phoenix Market city, Kurla as part of their India Tour.

Keeping that in mind, we check out their second album ‘Battleground’.

The album’s title is fitting considering the competition that The Wanted face at the moment, with co – patriots One Direction on their heels to steal the limelight, if not the girls. The Wanted for those who don’t know, are a British pop boy band based in London and comprise of Max George, Siva Kaneswaran, Jay McGuiness, Tom Parker, and Nathan Sykes.

The Wanted burst onto the pop scene in 2010, when the boy band era was had vanished, with little or no competition. Their sophomore effort has a different feel from their self – titled debut, more ballads this time, but also a few dance pop hits for the year. The album is more mature, better produced, and on the whole showing real signs of progress, but sadly it still struggles to hit real high and the boy band status. The Wanted who knew that Westlife was long gone, have not managed to bring a top of the line album, but we prod on the album and see what it has to offer, nevertheless.

The Wanted have all the ingredients of a boy band. Good looks, a few good melodies and above all, music that would make you cuddle up or jump onto the dance floor. The big trump comes from their single Glad you came a jumpy piece of work, and pure boy band material. Warzone has dub step fusing with piano chords and a catchy chorus with spacious beats. It starts off slowly and builds up to an up tempo melody. It also has orchestral touches, very emotional lyrics too. The same goes for the catchy Lie to Me that has its good moments. Another topper is Lightning with a touch of Euro disco, while the finale Gold Forever is a pure pop ballad. The other tracks that are less up-tempo would be fillers, as they fail to impress with no catchy choruses and great hooks.

As is with boy bands, the one thing you can expect them talking about is about love, love and more love. You have the Grammy winner Dianne Warren penned power ballad Rocket that sadly fails to fire off the ground, due to its drab lyrics that don’t really appeal. The Weekend is self explanatory and talks about the boys asking their girl to go out for… well the weekend. On the chart-topper Glad You Came its lyrics may not be very original, but it has enough charisma and summer friendly production that makes it a total replay anytime, saying ‘The sun goes down, the stars come out, and all that counts is here and now, My universe will never be the same, I’m glad you came….’ Simple, but impressive. You also have a well produced Lie to me which sadly is a non-starter with shoddy lyrics.

The quintet is powerful, and well tuned to making a difference, but when you listen to the album at one go, it gets a little repetitious as most songs overlap each other right from track one which means you hit the topper Glad You Came.  This track is followed by Lightning, which features a catchy, sing along chorus. The boys make a go for the up tempo tracks and even on high and lows excel in every way, with each singing in a slightly different direction with unison almost well timed. This is not a minus point, but looking at tracks like Warzone, I want to know the feel of the right groove and tone is achieved, but cueing to pieces like Rocket, Invincible they tend to get wayward a bit.

Touching on just the good tracks here, which are relatively few, Glad You Came starts off with a very soft piano before kicking into life with an upbeat dance sound. As with Glad You Came, ‘Warzone’ opens with a gentle piano part, and suddenly bursts into a slow dub step beat, incorporating both piano and electric synth sounds. The Weekend is enjoyable, especially the pulsing synth segments. A pure dance track, we’d say. Lie to Me which comes in at the end, is a pleasingly good song, a twist of Coldplay sound, with a slight rock flavor. Last To Know has the use of church organs in the background and towering beats that sound good for some time, but soon falls flat. I'll Be Your Strength coming in midway, has piano chords and subdued bass, a ballad, something the band should’ve focused on more on the album.

‘Battleground’ is a clean club pop – ballad set clocking about 37 minutes, with the only negative energy being that it lacks a little originality. But fans would not mind this as there are enough singles to chill out with. A little variety would’ve done the trick to make it more special and worth cueing on again and again. For example, The Weekend and Glad You Came sound far too similar. Hopefully with their next album there’ll be more variety. On the other hand, the boys harmonize well, their vocals are pretty amazing, just a little change would make them reach super stardom and take the crown as the best boy band around.  All in all, it is a good, but not great album.

Rating: ****

By Verus Ferreira