At a time when the music industry desperately needs a new main pop boy, Harry Styles should be the total package. He was the frontman of one of the most successful boy bands of all time, he is capable of putting up consistent hits (even though the legitimacy of his most recent one is under question) and, most important, the ladies love him.

One major caveat, though: Styles seems completely uninterested in mainstream pop stardom. Too bad what we get instead is someone uninterested in being interesting.

Throughout his career, Styles has been perceived as somewhat subversive. He’s been compared to the likes of Prince and David Bowie due, mostly, to the glam-rock tinges of his early music.

His wardrobe isn’t beholden to gender expectations, often opting for dresses and more feminine silhouettes. He played into, and benefited from, assumptions of queerness despite exclusively dating women publicly – a can of worms I will NOT indulge in today. No ma’am. However, all this subversion is missing from the music, which is a pretty even split of inoffensive and pretty good. Perhaps we let fans’ generous perceptions of Styles skew our expectations. Maybe the ugly dresses just made him happy!

Styles has always reminded me of the one very unassuming coworker you exchange pleasantries with until one day you stalk his Instagram account on your burner and discover he raves on the weekend and does ketamine with gay boys. For a second, you’re quite gagged. You spend some time daydreaming about his double life until you talk with him the next day and realize he’s just a (normal?) guy with a (exciting?) hobby.

Styles is just a guy, and all the legendary comparisons, boy band iconography and gaudy, sequin getups can’t distract from the fact that he’s so achingly boring.

Styles' new album is best when it discos more than occasionally

That fact remains uncontested on his latest album, “Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally.” Yes, you read that right. It’s another installment of Styles' catalog of perfectly fine, sometimes good tunes. He’s ditched the acoustic floorboards of his previous effort, “Harry’s House,” for more electronic production, committing some grand-theft-LCD Soundsystem along the way.

“Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally,” or “Kissco” as some fans brand it, takes the latter half of its title a bit too literally. It's best when it dances. Lead single and opening track “Aperture” grooves with a thumping Jersey beat and electronic flares. It’s grown on me quite a bit since its release. “Pop” bounces with a similar electric energy, but trades a Jersey bassline for the arena rock elements we’ve come to expect from Styles. “Dance No More” is good if you ignore the lyrics.

The quality of the rest of the album varies. Most songs sound oddly dated, like something a quarantine-era indie band would advertise on TikTok with the trite “did we just make the song of the summer?!?!?!?” slogan (see: “Ready, Steady, Go!")

On others, the electronic beeps and bops are merely window dressing. “The Waiting Game” would’ve been more aptly titled “The Loading Screen” for how tepid and yawn-inducing it is.

"Season 2 Weight Loss” opens with some buzzing electronic noises that become accented by layers of syncopation. Lyrically, he’s unintelligible. The verses portray a sense of insecurity half-remedied by self-regulation. “You've got to sit yourself down sometimes,” he bookends each refrain. On the chorus, though, doubt remains as he repeatedly questions if he is, or ever will be, loved.

The chorus of "Ready, Set, Go!" is equally opaque as he references some character named Leon: “But you call Leon/ You call it only in my head/ Cause you’ve got enough/ While we do too much/ But you call Leon/ You did call it only in my head.” If that's supposed to mean something, it's certainly lost on me.

It all reaches for depth that never reaches back.

Styles finds meaning elsewhere

The lyrical ambiguity on other tracks conveys layered meanings much better. On “Pop,” he could be talking about drugs or sex or music or his career, or everything everywhere all at once. Despite its boredom, the second verse of “Paint By Numbers” could mean a lot of things. (Sidenote: Harry, if you want to give us acoustic ballads, you have to figure out what to do with that voice.)

“Holdin' the weight of the American children whose hearts you break,” he croons. This could be about his past relationship with actress and director Olivia Wilde, the untimely passing of his former bandmate Liam Payne or a secret third thing.

The album is at its second best when Styles successfully marries his singer-songwriter sensibilities with the electronic elements he’s grown newly fond of. “Taste Back,” with its MGMT vibes, and album closer “Carla’s Song” prove Styles’ canon simplicity doesn’t always result in mundane outcomes.

We need a new main pop boy. Styles it is! ... I guess

Despite the inconsistencies in this record, Style is our most viable option to fill our culture’s main-pop-boy void. Justin Bieber has forgone pop for alternative R&B, tapping Dijon and Mk.gee to legitimize his transition. No one cares about Ed Sheeran anymore. Bruno Mars can’t stop making wedding music. The Weeknd’s music is too varied to pin down. Shawn Mendes wants to be Noah Kahan, as if one of him isn’t enough.

And none of the new crop of pop boys can capture any legitimate attention, either. No one over the age of 17 takes this “Sombr” character seriously. Alex Warren is (thank God) shaping up to be a one-hit wonder. Benson Boone thinks he’s Simone Biles despite his vocal (in)abilities.

Mainstream audiences are too tasteless for Troye Sivan. And Lil Nas X burned up all his goodwill with cheap gimmicks.

Styles occupies a place no one else can. “Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally” is a half-hearted foray into dance music that’s OK all the time, pretty good occasionally. After all, someone has to make music for Target commercials … or sushi restaurants.

Kofi Mframa is a columnist and digital producer at USA TODAY and the USA TODAY Network.

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