BMG
★★★☆
Listening to Steps’ second album since reforming in 2017, it’s clear what the future needs to hold for everyone’s favourite fromage barge: enough big tunes to slip among the hits for next year’s arena tour without making everyone look at their watch waiting for One For Sorrow. On that basis, What The Future Holds is a triumph: co-written by Greg Kurstin and Sia, the title track has more of a Lady Gaga air of drama than usual while keeping Steps’ big grins firmly in place and Brian Higgins and MNEK create Xenomania’s most surgically precise production in ages on To The Beat Of My Heart’s euphoric rush.
As for the ballads, the second half’s opening salvo of One Touch and Under My Skin has the necessary OTT (over-) commitment for mass armwaving in the aisles. There’s plenty of filler, as the second side subsides into anonymous slowies and Heartbreak In This City’s self-parodic knock-off eurotrash, but ‘twas ever thus. Rallying for the catchy To The One - polished proto-EDM doing old school Steps to perfection, now old enough to be called “retro” - Steps are spoilt for choice for fresh classics. Entertaining intra-band scraps allowing, their future is looking pretty bright all over again.