LIGHTLINES RELEASE THEIR DEBUT SINGLE - WASTED.
From Union J to alt-pop: George Shelley’s Lightlines arrive with ‘Wasted’
George Shelley’s new project demands a clean slate. ‘Wasted’, the debut single from Lightlines, swaps chart polish for distorted guitars and raw, confessional fury.
Shelley has done reinvention before. Once the fresh-faced singer of X Factor’s early 2010’s boyband Union J, Shelley has since made his acting debut and hosted The Capital Breakfast Show. Now, he steps into a new skin as the frontman of Lightlines.
Press Photo credit: Courtney Nathan Philip
Gone are the harmonies, the PR-curated lyrics, the soft-focus production. In their place: serrated guitar lines, bruised vocals and a frontman finally telling his own story.
Trading in formulaic pop hooks for a raw, guitar-driven sound anchored in emotional honesty, the single lays its influences bare: there’s a melodic punch here that channels early Foo Fighters, with a polished alt-rock edge reminiscent of Nothing But Thieves. Shelley’s delivery, meanwhile, hints at the dramatic urgency of Florence Welch.
Produced by drummer Will Jackson and featuring Alex Pothecary on guitars and bass, the track bursts open with a riff-heavy intro and propulsive drums, giving way to a tightly controlled verse that teases vulnerability, then the chorus lets it all go. There’s a satisfying tension throughout, between restraint and release, gloss and grit, underpinned by the track’s live instrumentation, which adds warmth and personality to Shelley’s voice.
Vocally, Shelley sounds revitalised. Gone is the highly produced croon of Union J-era balladry; in its place is a more textured delivery that leans into anguish and resolve. “I wrote ‘Wasted’ in the aftermath of a breakdown,” Shelley says, that emotional backdrop bleeding through the track’s confessional lyrics. Lines like “You tried to shrink me down / into the shape you wanted” and “I gave you all my light / you left me in the dark” gesture toward both personal rupture and wider creative suffocation.
The song’s title becomes a double entendre, a lament for lost time and wasted energy, as well as a commentary on escapism through substance abuse and self-sabotage. There’s a touch of therapy-speak here, allusions to boundaries, control and self-worth, but it feels lived-in.
Given Shelley’s quiet retreat from the spotlight in recent years followed by a slow rebuild from the ground up, ‘Wasted’ feels less like a comeback and more like a release.