Glasgow threesome PAWS made a lot of waves in 2012 with their debut album, 'Cokefloat'. The album was longlisted for Scottish Album of the Year and received a great deal of critical praise for its lo-fi pop-punk tracks with rich lyrical themes, like the recent death of frontman, Philip Taylor's mother.

PAWS start Youth Culture Forever starts just as sombre sounding like a stoned-off-their-tits Teenage Fanclub singing cheery lines as “Do you know what it's like? To sit there in stone watching your best friends die.”. These emotionally bare lyrics hidden behind the huge guitars and distorted vocals is another feather to PAWS' bow.

The album then speeds up with fun and instantly catchy tracks, 'Tongues', 'Someone New' and the colourfully titled 'Owl Talons Clutching At My Heart'. 'Cokefloat' drew a great deal of comparison to 90s bands like Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr., however, these tracks seem to have more in common with recent bands like The Cribs and The Vaccines. These tracks are incredibly fun and are among the best songs on the album.

The next two tracks have a very low lyric count. While the lyrical minimalism adds to, acoustic ballad, Alone's vulnerability, the elongated “Give up! Give u-u-u-u-up! Give up!” in 'Give Up' only really comes across as lazy songwriting. This unfortunately carries on through the album in Narcissist and Let's All Let Go.

Alone ends the upbeat danceable music on the past five tracks. The track features Taylor urging his subject not to commit suicide. So, yeah... there goes my buzz. The first two thirds of the track are sang and played alone by Philip Taylor with the band coming in on the third. A more satisfying release for the tension built up throughout the track may have been to play one chorus once the band had joined in.

PAWS return to their dancy catchy punk on the next three tracks. An Honest Romance would be a singalong anthem if only it were possible to decipher the chorus's lyrics. Narcissist and Let's All Go are fun but are perhaps too similar to Give Up.

'Great Bear', a short repetitive instrumental track which does very little for this writer, is followed by almost the title track 'YCF'. YCF is a another acoustic track played by Taylor which talk about returning to his home town which he does not look to kindly upon. The track displays wry lyricism with lines like “I know I said this in a song before but fuck it, life goes on.” It isn't clear whether the album's titular line is sarcastic or whether it's describing the feeling of youth more as a curse. It isn't a celebration of youth, anyway.

Album closer, 'Warcry' transitions from an very intimate solo performance from Taylor (throat clears and everything) to just fuck off riffage. As Taylor closes the second solo section with “Hear my warcry sui... cide”, waiting for the drop is incredibly exciting. Howevever, the track is 11 minutes long. After two minutes, the vocals have finished. After another three minutes of guitars with a tonne of delay and reverb on them playing over the same bass line, you just want the song to end. The track only comes across as self-indulgence.

Youth Culture Forever sets a balance between punky, insanely catchy pop and dreary solo tracks with grungy anthems opening and closing the album. It is a far more ambitious effort than it's predesson and, therefore, makes more false steps. However, the choruses are better than on 'Cokefloat', the lyrics are frequently brilliant and there a lot of interesting risks taken.

A strong set from Charlie Simpson at a packed out King Tuts in Glasgow leaves a lot of promise for the singer-songwriter’s upcoming second album release next July.

When we say ‘packed out’ too, we’re really not kidding. The event was sold out, and anyone who has been to King Tuts before will know that this results in a crammed in session at the compact venue where the word ‘humid’ proves the ultimate understatement when describing the heat.

The setlist would offer up a selection of songs from Simpson’s first solo record Young Pilgrim and unheard tracks from new album Long Road Home as well.

He kicked off the night with a rendition of Thorns, with the vocal audience seemingly surprising Simpson right away as they reverberated back the lyrics to the catchy tune. Well known for his idealist visions of what he wants his music to be, Simpson performed well, with his signature rugged vocals flying over fast-running, melodic guitar riffs throughout the set.

A selection of new songs, including the recently released Winter Hymns, continued the natural music process, although it was at times difficult to differentiate from each song as the template of progressive guitar work and lifts at the chorus continued through the set.

Regardless, each song performed was near enough spot on with the record recordings – no misplaced notes or chords – and when the difference could be heard, it was all for the positive as the passion on the sleeves of Simpson shone through.

The title track from Long Road Home received a debutant play to a reception that will please the artist, but for the crowd, it was really all about the old material.

Cemetery sounded to widespread cheers, with Simpson taking a break on the chorus as the audience took over the vocals in a choir-like performance. Ten more Days and Parachutes too proved popular tracks, while Down Down Down was a main highlight, the looping instrumental sounds working brilliantly with vocals that burst into life halfway through.

The concluding numbers would be Farmer & His Gun and Riverbank, and as Simpson thanked the crowd and shredded out some impressive final sounds on his acoustic guitar, it was clear that he really was grateful and was loving his music.

A good night in Glasgow. And, most impressive of all, we managed to get through this whole Charlie Simpson review without mentioning Busted.

Aw, wait. Shit.

                                                                                                                                        Stuart Kenny