A remarkable improvement over 1980's extremely spotty , 1983's often rises to the level of 's 1979 masterpiece . The pantheistic hymn that opens and closes the album (the first in a simple and gorgeous voice and accordion setting, the last in a swelling choral version with a full band) sets a tone for the entire song cycle, one hinted at in the cover photo of a tattered painting of a lamb (a common Christ symbol) and explicated in the second track, the joyously heretical shaggy-dog story in which gives a lift to a hitchhiker who turns out to be , who promptly pulls a gun and takes off with his wheels ("The Lord moves in mysterious ways, and tonight my son, he's gonna use your car"). Throughout the rest of the album, returns almost obsessively to the theme of religion's place in the modern world. sets images of the atrocities committed on both sides of the religious conflict in Northern Ireland to a bitterly ironic Celtic death march, while the -style theme song for a play by 's wife , questions ' love for humanity. Tragicomic vignettes like and (both remade from 's 1975 debut, ) also touch on the same themes in more idiosyncratic ways. And for all its lyrical strength, is equally impressive musically. Reeling back the edge of without returning to the acoustic setting of most of , mixes , and oddball like -era without the " " fetish. A satisfying and often fascinating album, is one of 's best. ~ Stewart Mason