Depressing though it is to us regular, untalented folk that Jake Bugg turned 19 just last week, it is thoroughly refreshing to hear an album with clear influences such as Johnny Cash, The Beatles and Jimi Hendrix.

The spectacular eponymous album was released at the tail-end of last year, perhaps on the off chance the world did end. And, if it had, at least we would have been given the fantastic gift of Jake Bugg; his talent for such a young man is outrageous.

And how amazing it is to hear, too, when the charts are full of club songs and viral wonders. The dominance of Rock & Roll of yesteryear has unfortunately given away to a get-drunk-and-party-orientated youth with ‘YOLO’ as their only agenda.

Perhaps it was fitting then that in the week Bugg celebrated his 19th birthday,Rock & Roll celebrated a small victory in the UK charts: Pompeii by Bastille hit number 2, only beaten to the top spot by the regrettably talented and likeable Justin Timberlake’s ‘Mirrors’ by a few thousand copies.

In the words of Mr Bugg himself, “Something’s changing”. The third track on the album, ‘Two Fingers’, features these hopeful words and though they might not be related to the revival of Rock & Roll, one can only hope they will be eerily appropriate when the general public catches wind of the enormous talent of Jake Bugg, and, that they are ready for Rock & Roll to feature in the charts significantly.

Upon my first listen of ‘Lightning Bolt’, the highest-charting single from the album, I genuinely thought it was a song from the golden era of Rock that I’d neglected to listen to previously.
And for fans of this era, the rest of the album does not disappoint either. With dramatic melodies reminiscent of the late, great, Johnny Cash and incredible wisdom in his lyrics, it is a wonder Bugg is yet to reach 20.