Album review: Steve Angello’s Wild Youth takes a while to warm up, but when it does, it catches fire

Wild Youth by Steve Angello. Size Records via AP

Wild Youth

Steve Angello

(Size)

Three stars

The second solo album from DJ-producer Steve Angello – one-third of former EDM supergroup Swedish House Mafia – is a consistent, if less-than-daring, release that pins its hopes mainly on a strong roster of male guest vocals.

If there was ever an EDM thematic distant cousin to Pink Floyd's The Wall, Wild Youth might be it. Songs about youngsters being brave and striking out on their own against the world clamouring to hold them back is the common refrain here.

Children of the Wild, featuring Mako, is a solid track to that effect. It is followed by the fun and bouncy Last Dance, with Franz Novotny.

Angello stays within himself, in a production sense, and eschews the brash edges that have come to define the current direction of EDM. He is more of a smooth operator here, just as he was in his Swedish House Mafia days alongside Axwell and Sebastian Ingrosso.

The best track is Remember, featuring The Presets.

Hopefully, someone will remix this five-minute gem into a 10-minute marathon track so we can all give the dance floor a good run. It takes a while to warm up, but when it does, it catches fire.