"I have emotional whiplash,"
John Grant
sings on
The Art of the Lie
. Considering how his songs swing from sardonic to confessional and back again, that's not an unusual response to his music. On his sixth album, however, he navigates ever-changing moods with more confidence and nuance than he did on
Boy from Michigan
. That record's drastic tonal shifts echoed how complex
Grant
's feelings about family and U.S. politics were and how they pushed his music to its limit; on
, his explorations of betrayal and deception -- exemplified in his eyes by the hypocrisy and manipulation of the Christian right -- are more cohesive. They're also more specific:
homes in on the bottomless grief following the murder of a gay man on "Mother and Son," where
Rachel Sermanni
's caressing vocals lend a hint of solace. Like
,
's most personal tracks are among the most powerful. The processing on
's vocals doesn't detract from the gnawing ache of "Father," a remembrance of his childhood home that links all of the album's themes eloquently. On "Daddy," paternal love turns horrifying when he sings "There would always come a time/You'd deliver me to them/For what I am is a sin" over creeping synths. The pain in these songs feels more real, more tangible than on
's other albums, and it often bleeds into
's satirical tracks. Anger and anguish are close to the surface on "Meek AF"'s squelchy funk, which pairs some of his most amusing imagery ("your spirit animal is a bulldozer") with some of his most dreadful (a true believer who drags his gay son behind his truck).
co-produced the album with
Brigitte Fontaine
and
Grace Jones
collaborator
Ivor Guest
, and the polish they bring to
unites moments like the formidably fractured guitar solo that ends "The Child Catcher" and the satin sheen of "All That School for Nothing"'s strutting musings on wasted potential. It wouldn't be a
album without some choice wordplay, and "Nothing"'s "I lost my patience several decades ago/Around the time i was in utero" is one of
's pithiest turns of phrase along with "I've got the poise of a newborn giraffe" from "Marbles," a head-over-heels ballad that serves as the lone reminder that there are still some purely good things in this corrupt world. Though wit and sincerity have never been opposites in
's music, he's never brought them -- as well as beauty, cruelty, anger, and love -- together quite as potently as he does on
's portraits of a society tearing itself apart. ~ Heather Phares