Fame fame fatal fame. It can play hideous tricks on the brain; while Foster the People got more than a taste of it with their 2011 debut Torches, their follow up record Supermodel is concerned with their disillusions of success in the music industry. “Is this the life you’ve been waiting for?” the band sing on “Ask Yourself”; rock stardom, as it turns out, isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

Supermodel is the ‘difficult second album’ personified. The pressures of success, and heavy touring have lead to rushed, uninspiring new material that is destined to disappoint. The only twist to this tired cliché here is that the band are so painfully conscious of it that the album struggles to get past its own self-awareness; “I’m stepping away/’Cause I got nothing to say”.

The album is lacklustre, and suffers for a lack of purpose and intent. All the youthful zeal evident on Torches has been sapped, and a lethargy weighs heavy upon the album. While the sonic palette is very similar to their debut, the stylistic fervour and spontaneity of the spiralling, beguiling dance floor indie pop is gone, along with the tunes. Anaemic lead single “Coming of Age” misses all of the eccentricity of the band’s previous releases; coming of age seems here to constitute getting a little bit older and a lot less interesting.

But the main difference between Supermodel and its predecessor is its concern with pretentious introspection. A blend of morbid theme and shimmering indie pop was done so deftly on “Pumped Up Kicks” back in 2011, and held the key to the band’s appeal. But their most recent effort is preoccupied entirely with internal unease and the band’s own disillusion, and so loses the salient grim edge to its subject matter.

Ultimately, growing tired of fame is such an utterly un-endearing premise to build an LP around; so maybe Foster The People aren’t entirely happy with the way things are at the top, but are we supposed to empathise with them, these young guys that have ‘made it’ just as millions across the planet dream of doing? Of course not.

The ponderous “Fire Escape” sees Supermodel end on a bathetic whimper, and brings the end to an irritable and self-pitying affair. Off the back of a top ten debut record and a smash summer single in the “Pumped Up Kicks”, Foster The People’s second effort ends up coming across as ineffably brattish.