GARY BARLOW
MUSIC PLAYED BY HUMANS
WW
POLYDOR
★★★☆
Gary Barlow’s fifth album begins with an orchestra tuning up before he welcomes them with news of its title. Polite laughter greets the calculated message he’s sending with an album of nostalgic big band and symphonic songs in an era of algorithms and AI, but the funnier joke is the concession that, until now, Barlow’s own records haven’t been made by humans.