Review Summary: Ever get the feeling that the story isn't done?
Mark Oliver Everett never had much use for an expansive vocabulary. His moniker is just E, his band is just Eels, and
The Deconstruction doesn’t contain many more four-or-five-syllable words outside of its title. He’s been dealing in his particular brand of hard truths - or vague platitudes - for twenty-odd years and twelve odd albums, consistently filling the bill of emotionally charged yet vocally detached, curmudgeonly-old-man indie rock. So let’s keep this blunt.
The Deconstruction is a disingenuous title because E might be happier than ever, throwing a sucker punch of optimism once he’s lured you in with the worn cliches of his formulaic and simplistic rhyme schemes. Emphasis on “might”; there’s an emotional potency to rival
Electro-Shock Blues in the context surrounding the album - from the failure of E’s marriage to the joy of parenthood - but it never quite reaches the listener like it should, because E has always been in thrall to the limitations of his naturally melancholic sound. It doesn’t matter if there are more orchestral flourishes than
Hombre Lobo or less enthusiastic flinging-***-at-the-wall than his ‘90s material. It’s the same old E with the same old ‘60s pop tune in the same old ‘90s aesthetic, give or take a fuzz pedal and a radiator for percussion. And that’s a shame, because I wanted to believe in this record, and I believe in the sincerity of E’s perseverance in spite of the repetitive, cyclical nature of his themes or his life or his songwriting. But for whatever reason, this time I believe a little less. It could be that E insists on front-loading the album with sadness when it’s the least interesting part of it. Or it could be that E has always put so much and yet so little into his work - a memoir short on memory and an autobiography without end - that even after a considerable hiatus, it’s feels exhausting to experience another round. All the same, the most optimistic thing
The Deconstruction offers is a world where E is not alone, where the exhaustion passes and “Things the Grandchildren Should Know” can eventually shed irony for genuinity. He just has to make it there first.
