“I love you, and that’s why I have to let you go.”

The third studio from Dallas darling Annie Clark, better known as St. Vincent, has arrived in this month’s Strange Mercy. I had heard this and that about the record for a while, but it first really reared it’s head while I was in Chicago for the Pitchfork Music Festival in July. Every 2-3mins between acts, the giant screen on the festival grounds ran a commercial (which cost an impressive amount of money, I suspect, as it was one of only 2 or 3 ads and it ran EVERY DAY). The video showed a series of confessional-style shots of women delivering break-up speeches, ending with Annie telling us “I love you, and that’s why I have to let you go.”

Ironic, considering the dismissal of her entire band and most of the aesthetic from the (well loved) albums that she’s been criss-crossing the globe with over the last years. Surely it wasn’t them, it was her (isn’t that how it goes?). Clark safely sailed past the rocks of sophomore slump, and with that, has decided not to roll the dice on her original formula again. Time to switch things up.

The one hold-over from Actor is the brilliant TX producer John Congleton (remember perennial badasses The Paper Chase? THAT guy). JC delivered the production goods on the Dark Disney magic of Actor, and hits the sweet spot again on Strange Mercy, with every sound seemingly considered and placed/treated perfectly, including Clark’s exquisite voice, which he seems to greatly understand and respect. This is the best her voice has been recorded, to date, and that’s saying a lot.

Unfortunately, the break-up leading to this album has left the apartment kind of sparse. The old St. Vincent took much of the orchestral and organic with it. There are still occasional choir flourishes and some strings, but not enough to compare. Instead, the room is now frequented by (somewhat sleazy) synthesizers covering both the bass and 80′s-style pads in the mid-range. The album is airy and weirdly sparse much of the time, punctuated by highly-funky and intricate fuzz-guitar solos. AC is a brilliant, gifted guitarist, but it sounds like “hey, let’s just do a bunch of fuzzy, funky solos!” and she is just, simply better than that.

I LOVE ST. VINCENT and I think Annie is a muscular, visionary songwriter, in case this review has lost sight of that. I just don’t feel like there’s much heart or focus in this record, besides the focus on using synthesizers, which is not very visionary. Annie is still writing songs at a very high level, and many of the songs on Strange Mercy may not have worked at all with the old St.V format, so the change to suit the material may have been necessary. And the parts of this album that are good are FASCINATING, and that spans much of the lyrical and vocal content, and even the flippant guitar solos. This is still, obviously the work of one of modern music’s finest representatives.

The album’s high point, from a songwriting standpoint, comes with the late track “Hysterical Strength” which really utilizes the new orchestration and sounds unlike anything else Annie has done. It doesn’t sound like “hey, let’s use keyboards”, instead it is dense and tense and it smartly builds (like the St. V of old) and ends on a panting dime. The album closer, “Year of the Tiger” is the most hot and cold of all, with it’s compelling content, but kind of sheeshy Chinese synth line. Just like the rest of this record, it is as focused and unfocused as can be, and because we love her, the good will have to just be good enough. And it is.

Apologies to all the awesome break-up metaphors that I abandoned along the way. It wasn’t you, it was me. I just got scared, ok?