“I Swear It’s Not Cake” might, on the surface at least, feel like it takes a quite flippant theme —one that questions the fakery and illusion we find running through today’s media. But even what might seem like a harmless TV show or an amusing internet meme is just a small building block of the bigger issues in life today.
We can better understand global problems by seeing their reflection in everyday life. And that is the great thing about this album, it often takes the very small and seemingly matter-of-fact ideas and uses them to point at the really important stuff.
“Actual Bruh” runs on a cool groove of effect-soaked guitars, pulsing basses, and skittering drum patterns, to power a personal response (the title suggests that this is his actual sibling) to those who seek to belittle, ridicule, and bully others, again, something that can be used as a microcosm and metaphor for the world at large.
“Canned Laughter” wanders into almost folk-infused indie territory, “The Blue Train” feels like we have stumbled across a long lost piece of 60’s alt-pop, except for some lyrics that place it in a more modern setting, yet a timeless sentiment, the sort of thing that Scott Walker might be working on if he were around today.
The great thing about Chronic Disappointment, perhaps the most self-depricating and inaccurate title in musical history, is that it is hard to say where it fits into the musical landscape, thanks to its constant genre-shifting, sense of adventure and creativity, not to mention some serious songwriting chops from an artist who is playing every instrument you hear here. It is an album that is shifting yet somehow sonically consistent, exploratory yet doesn’t ever leave you behind.
If you can put a pin on the map, it must mean that you have heard something similar before. Shadow Person instead suggests that we turn the map over and start drawing a new one.
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