Fake Laugh - Dining Alone (2020)

Recorded between London and Berlin, Fake Laugh's second full length retains his ability to write unforgettable earworms but expands his lyrical and sonic horizons to make a set of humorous and somber tracks that come together as a cohesive whole. The album was made with close friend Louis Milburn and initially there was no end goal in sight; the joy of writing songs was the only focus. Rather than his usual strict recording process, Fake Laugh opted for a more improvised approach. This tactic kept things fresh and surprising in the studio and the record began to take shape naturally: a happy accident. The record, like his self-titled debut, is engaging, melodic and memorable. Here, however, there is an added sense of humour, both lyrically and compositionally. That said, there are also some of the most melancholic tracks Fake Laugh has ever made here. A case in point would be track Alarm Bells - a song split into two halves - where the first verse is about an intense fear for the safety of a loved one and the second is about mistakenly thinking that someone has written a song about you. Fake Laugh flits between irony and sincerity, leaving the listener with an uncertain range of emotions. Like the tracks, the album s title offers multiple interpretations. Fake Laugh reminds us that: depending on who you speak to, the act of dining alone is either embarrassing and awkward or honourable and enjoyable. Dining Alone manages to capture some of this ambiguity by complementary shades of humour and sadness. In making Dining Alone Fake Laugh has proven that he has the capacity to expand his songwriting and recording and is now looking ahead to the future where he says he will be releasing: a variety of records over the next couple of years that all have very different sounds.