Album Review: John Grant, The Art Of The Lie

It can be tricky territory, but John Grant has never been one to separate the interconnected worlds of humour and trauma. From the witty playfulness of the earth-shakingly funky ‘All That School For Nothing’ and ‘It’s A Bitch’, to the devastating, vocoder-centred reflections on ‘Father’, the Michigan-born artist’s new album, The Art Of The Lie, is an unapologetically grandiose-yet-compassionate portrait of what it means to be human in the chaotic 2020s.

Sweeping spaceship synths and experimental nods to ‘80s dance-pop stand alongside soulful, melodramatic ballads, as John moves between examinations of inner turmoil to contemplations about the world at large – taking aim at the scripture-twisting hypocrisies of white Christian nationalism on the vicious, yet ultimately triumphant ‘Meek AF’. But even as he finds release on the album’s most cathartic moments, an unnerving sense of impending doom is never far away – most notably on ‘The Child Catcher’, a track just about haunting enough to live up to its traumatising namesake.

Whether looking at the personal or the political, there’s absurdity and poignancy to be extracted from everything – and as The Art Of The Lie proves once again, no one walks us through the darkness better than John Grant.

8/10