Distortion

He's made a novelty record that gets deeper with time.

The perfect antidote to a season of false cheer and frozen toes.

This is a terrific album, one fully ready and suited for headphones; an album that should be easily enjoyed by all and that will surely be loved by many.

Distortion is really a triumph of the evening-out.

The epitome of a melancholy winter record.

Save the odd occasion where Merritt opts for smirking affect over emotional resonance, it all adds up to an excellent addition to an already distinguished back catalogue.

The latest, the crustily erotic Distortion, is nearly its ["69 Love Songs"] equal. But way shorter.

Distortion is above cynical reproach--effortlessly modern and definitively 2008, yet flitting with the ghosts of Shields, Madder Rose (ask your 90s alt.indie expert uncle) and The Jesus And Mary Chain.

A lovely addition to the noisy canon and a barbed new year tonic.

Distortion isn't a return to form so much as a return to content.

Merritt does what he always does. He writes clever songs that are sweet and bitter, comforting and subversive.

It rocks, in this case a meaningful, temporary departure. Its unmelded sonic gestalt suits its thematic disquiet. It's Stephin Merritt's second-best album, which is saying a great deal.

Distortion gets a lot right.

Distortion does not reinvent the wheel of alternative rock, but it may have just started it spinning again.

While the Jesus and Mary Chain might have been limited by their musical ability and knowledge, Merritt and company understand the pop principles they’re working with.

Distortion isn't an easy listen, with its strict, difficult palette. But it's an endlessly fascinating and provocative one.

It's that time of year when critics are desperate to anoint the first "great" record of the year. Distortion is too tricksy and knowing to be that, but it's a thoroughly entertaining also-ran nonetheless.

It's faux-naif orch-pop that crashes and thunders. [Feb 2008, p.108]

The fact is there are just too many smart, well-written songs on this album to get hung up on the messy sound.

The new record sees him pushing his songbook to extremes in entirely unexpected fashion.

Whether Merritt's return to lo-fi will fly at Lincoln Center remains to be seen, but his melodic mastery is never in question. [Winter 2008, p.108]

The lightness, even with the same downtrodden lyrics, comes from the upbeat arrangements that find their way through the slosh of feedback--an appropriate sound for lyrics that evoke the same feeling--sloshing through the everyday. Perhaps Merritt realizes that to be comically self-loathing or misanthropic is, perhaps, all a person can ask for.

After multiple listens, there are certainly a batch of songs that rise like cream to the top, and while the release doesn't have seriously low points, it's not as solid throughout as the best work from the group (especially towards the end).

It's a double-sided hook that clears the murkiness from the remaining five tracks, while simultaneously improving the first half (especially tracks like 'California Girls' and 'Please Stop Dancing') when spun for a second or third time.

Every instrument here distorts, giving tearjerkers like 'I’ll Dream Alone' complementary grit.

Despite its painfully obvious flaws, Distortion isn’t bad in the sense that it lacks gratifying melodies or does not possess a certain nostalgic charm.

Most of the songs have plenty to give in these spheres, so for fans this can be viewed as a qualified success, if never quite approaching previous highs.

He may be treading water a little until he really gets into his groove as the 21st century Sondheim, but Distortion at its best is beguiling and quietly devastating.

Ultimately, the album succeeds despite the extra fuss, not because of it.

There is plenty to enjoy, although it never comes close to recapturing the eclectic brillance of 1999's career high, "69 Love Songs. [Feb 2008, p.99]

When Distortion goes wrong, however, it dive-bombs.