Robbie Williams – Pocket Rocket Review

Part of the rollout to Robbie Williams’ Britpop album is hoping Better Man rolls back the clock on his image. He wishes to be perceived as a cheeky monkey, like the PG Tips puppet or Ronald Reagan’s Bedtime for Bonzo co-star. But it is in this old form of writing, the “cheeky monkey” style of speech which never left those who found themselves hauled into middle-class life by wild success. It dates the work and words Williams has to offer. Pocket Rocket is an example of that, and it’s such a letdown after the strengths of lead single, Rocket. The Tony Iommi-featuring song was a strong start to a new era for Williams, who has finally cracked the pop-adjacent tones. His shift to soft-rock and use of a term derided by everyone associated with it revives Williams’ image. Where Pocket Rocket may not push the boundaries of music, it does see how much a listener can take of the Angels songwriter. 

At least he did write Angels, and Rock DJ. We must hunt the artificially generated slop Williams has planted somewhere on Britpop. A problem for the future. First, we must tackle the problem of Pocket Rocket, a dire offering on the back of a strong, Black Sabbath-featuring single. It’s that sickly sweet sincerity Williams would offer during the peak of his solo career that comes through. A song of possession and hopes for a sincerely bright future. That earnestness, the sugary view of a life ahead, is a nice reflection on where Williams now finds himself. Sincerity only takes Williams so far as his cultural image still feels like an undeserved self-insert into relevant moments of the last few years. An album cover which prompts thoughts on Just Stop Oil must be backed by better material than Pocket Rocket. But the return from Williams has been nice, nonetheless, because he is challenging the perception of his sound.  

He did so on Rocket, which pairs nicely with Pocket Rocket for reasons beyond the title. Williams’ celebration of life on Pocket Rocket cannot be considered anything less than genuine, and that is what keeps it from falling down the slippery slope of genre trickery. Those strings are uneventful, and though they are in place to tug at the heartstrings, all they do is recall where Williams was on his last release. A sincere but forgettable moment is what Pocket Rocket offers. That tug between tones of the past, which cemented Williams as a chart-topping sensation, and new experiments with the Iommi-featuring Rocket. Reaction from a wider audience is, unfortunately, set to decide which one Williams will pursue. He should have more confidence in new material, a better belief in those heavier rock tones, instead of being swayed by listeners.

A song which, shuffled into the mix of Williams’ other works, does very little to stand out. It’s too similar to what came before, not just in his discography, but in the soppy sentimentality which captures the hearts and minds of those still listening to the radio. That faux friendship and lab-grown relatability may be based in truth and life, but its instrumental excess, the rhyming structure of the lyrics, all feels a tad comical. It’s no mockery of the genre, though. This is as genuine as it gets for Williams during this period. Pair it with Rocket, a song with a sound that seems far off what Britpop was aiming for, and Pocket Rocket crumbles. Williams heads back into his past to make an album for the future, writing as he wanted to when he first left Take That. Reflection has never been a strong suit of his music, and it takes him thirty years to feel for the meaning behind these memories. Hopefully there are stronger moments than Pocket Rocket within Britpop.