Years & Years sounds as much like Years & Years as ever. That’s saying something since 2 of its 3 members departed in early 2021, effectively transforming Years & Years into the solo project of Olly Alexander. The synth, dance, and electro pop elements still fuel the music. And Olly continues to flex his capacity for penning and delivering big pop hooks with massive potential at pop radio and for remixers to go to town on, all while putting his integrity as a gay man first, into his songwriting and singing.

One look at the album cover and it’s evident that Olly is laying it all out for the gays. He plays into the title Night Call, by transforming into a mermaid/siren (on some versions of the album he’s being viewed through a ship’s porthole). This electro-pop album is driven by encounters, entanglements, and relationships, with an emphasis on the former two. There’s attraction, flirtation, sex, disappointment, and retaliation. It roots itself in gay experiences that can’t be told by anyone but us.

From the album’s opening notes, it’s electro, dance, and club-ready. The mesmerizing muddy synth of “Consequences” is equal parts the song’s inspirations: Stevie Wonder and Prince. It’s steeped in retaliation. “You’re gonna have to suffer consequences,” he warns. Lead single “Starstruck” merges the instant attraction we feel for another person with the awe we experience when we encounter a celebrity. It places a regular person we’re attracted to on that celebrity pedestal, accessing that same overwhelmed sense of “I can’t help it, I get starstruck around you.” The hook works both ways, and hits just a little bit harder when one of Olly’s idols, Kylie Minogue remixes the record (which is included on the album’s deluxe edition alongside Olly and Kylie’s fall hit from her recent Disco: Guest List Edition reissue, “A Second To Midnight”).

With each album, Olly has moved closer and closer to talking about sex outright. He notably slipped a record about bottoming onto the soundtrack to Bridget Jones’ Baby, “Meteorite.” Palo Santo’s lead single “Sanctify” was also undoubtedly a sex-driven record, as was that album’s Japan bonus track, “Coyote.” As a solo act, he’s finally singing about it outright.

He’s sex-conflicted on “Intimacy,” where he concedes “your sex is heaven… but I don’t want you to be another lesson learned.” He struggles to discern what kind of sex he wants, while elsewhere he’s crystal clear. “The only thing I crave is the pain from you” he coos on the chorus of “Crave,” a record about submitting. Olly is satisfying the need for more gay men in contemporary pop who aren’t afraid to write and sing about sex, in all its different shades.

Continuing the sex-driven records, he mixes just the right amount of specificity to illustrate the not-even-a-one-night-stand experience of a hookup on “20 Minutes.” It’s casual, but the lack of extended intimacy is predicated on his fragile emotional state not being over his previous relationship. He sums it up best in the bridge, singing, “So much can happen in twenty minutes… it was love… it felt so dramatic… and it’s beautifully tragic.”

He’s still focusing on other elements of relationships as he did on previous albums. In one moment he targets a dream man who just turned out to be a sweet “Sweet Talker,” sweetened even more by a sweeping string section courtesy of electronic duo Galantis. The strings coupled with the rest of the production give this a disco-meets-90’s-dance sense. In a win for album sequencing he switches the angle on “Sooner or Later,” where he chases a “heartbreaker.” It may be the death of Olly, but he’s hell-bent on finding this man.

And then in the midst of everything else, there’s one record that has nothing to do with men, but in a pinch can apply to a romantic disentanglement. The standard edition closes with a tribute to his late grandmother, “See You Again.” Though the light thumping of the beat makes it club ready, the chord progression and vocals overflow with melancholy, not to mention lyrics like “I pretend, I’ll see you again.”. It almost manages to upstage the album’s heartbreak record “Make It Out Alive,” where “every word twists like a knife” as the album’s saddest and most emotional record. Years & Years may be down from three members to one but Olly Alexander is three for three on albums thanks to Night Call.

Stream Night Call

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The doors of Webster Hall opened promptly at 10pm. By 10:45, the room was crowded and the temperature was going up. By 11:15, the crowd was sweating and getting impatient. Finally, shortly after 11:30, Emre Türkmen and Mikey Goldsworthy took their positions on each side of the stage. Then, Olly Alexander’s vocals filled the main room of Webster Hall with the first line from “Foundation”, the opening track off Years & Years’ debut album Communion. After delivering the first few lines, he slowly slinked his way to the stage in a skin-tight, white mesh shirt and flag-adorned sweat pants.

For a show that was branded “After Dark” and “presented by Governor’s Ball” with a (scheduled) start time of 10:30pm, I admit that I did not expect a set list as extensive as we were gifted. They played 11 out of the 15 original songs on their debut album Communion, and a mashup of two covers. If that’s not getting your money’s worth for a $25 show, I don’t know what is.

The energy in the room was nothing short of dynamic. Olly proved that he is a tried and true front man throughout the show. His ability to both feed off of and into the audience’s energy during the performance was magic and moving. Literally moving. Throughout most of the show, especially during peak upbeat moments, the crowd was so active that the floor shook.

Song after song, Olly sang and danced and the audience sang and danced right back, unwaveringly. Whether it be singles such as “Take Shelter”, “Shine”, and “Real” or album cuts “Gold”, “Ties”, and even deluxe edition bonus track “I Want To Love”, the room was a giant sing-a-long dance party. They put their own spin on Katy Perry’s “Dark Horse”, and seamlessly re-arranged it to fit their musical style. Even better, they seamlessly integrated Drake’s “Hotline Bling”.

One fan even got the experience of a lifetime during the sole down-tempo moment of the show. She had a sign asking to sit next to Olly while the band performed “Eyes Shut”. He jumped into the crowd, brought her up, and sat her down next to him as he poured his heart out and played the piano. The show closed with their latest single “Desire”, followed by a performance of “King” the audience was so loud, Olly took out his ear piece because he clearly had no chance of hearing himself.

After the show, the street was mobbed with fans overflowing from the venue. It was a clear that many of them (myself included) wanted a moment of face time with the band. Clearly the guys had the right idea of rushing out and hopping into a car. You know you’ve made it when you can’t do post-show impromptu meet-and-greets because there are too many fans lingering.

What’s better than getting a good set list? Being less than 50 feet away from a band you love, who are playing an incredible set in a venue half the size of one they sold out 8 months ago, and who played to a crowd of thousands the day before.

Setlist:

Foundation

Take Shelter

Worship

Border

Shine

Eyes Shut

Dark Horse/ Hotling Bling (Katy Perry/Drake mashup)

Ties

Gold

I Want To Love

Real

Desire

King

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