This week’s Album of the Week belongs to ROLE MODEL, the Maine-born songwriter Tucker Pillsbury, whose third full-length Chuck Timely & The Hourglass landed on the 7th of August via Interscope. It arrives at a fascinating moment in his story. Two years ago, 2024’s Kansas Anymore turned him from a promising indie-pop name into a genuine star, largely on the back of “Sally, When the Wine Runs Out,” a slow-burn heartbreak singalong that took on a life of its own online. The pressure to simply repeat that trick must have been enormous — so it’s telling that Pillsbury did the opposite. He reportedly had to talk his own label out of bringing in big-name producers, choosing instead to write and produce the record himself alongside close collaborators Mason Stoops and Taylor Mackall. The result is loose, confident and unmistakably his.
The album’s curious title comes from Chuck Timely, a fictional time traveller who — by Pillsbury’s own account — has rubbed shoulders with everyone from Michael Jackson to Olivia Rodrigo. It’s less a strict concept album than a playful frame, a way of stepping back from the raw confessional mode of his earlier work and writing instead about the freewheeling, complicated business of being single. Musically it’s a real pivot: slick, sun-warmed Americana with a country-radio glint to it, a world away from the bedroom-pop where he began. Lead singles “High Hopes 3000” and “Joy” set the tone, and there’s real wit in the writing — “Song Is All You Get” cheekily argues that heartache is worth it if you get a good tune out of it, while “Service Receipt” spins a whole diner flirtation into a hook.
Critics have called it his most likeable record yet, and it’s easy to hear why. By putting a little creative distance between himself and the material, Pillsbury has made something warmer and more generous than a straight sequel to Kansas Anymore could ever have been — an album that trades solipsism for charm without losing an ounce of craft. It’s smart, it’s smooth, and it’s the sound of an artist trusting his own instincts.
New Zealand Net Radio plays a song from our irregularly updated #albumoftheweek every hour from 9am to 12pm. Listen on our website - https://www.nznetradio.net.nz/listen
