4 out of 5

Label: 4AD

Produced by: Annie Clark, John Congleton

After finding her voice on her debut, Annie Clark’s career as St. Vincent has been an entertainingly evolving show of maintaining her confident and calculated presentation while learning when and where to let tension and darkness bubble up.  ‘Actor’ is an incredibly strong sophomore album, and gives the impression of being as fully rendered as anything from Ms. Clark’s oeuvre, though it somewhat loses its thread toward disc’s end.  But, the slew of instrumentation captured by John Congleton – whose work with Clark is a perfect combo, harkening back to his 90 Day Men albums, which were lush and rich and organic with a bit more wiggle room in the sound than he allowed on his own Paper Chase project – never feels reaching or out of place, it’s only that frightened smile balancing act that finally topples.  Despite this, within any given song, every note feels precise, and every beat measured.  While Clark’s lyrical content might not strike any personal themes for me, her albums are undeniably impactful in how immediately they come across as works of art.

Actor does a lovely dance for most of its runtime, tinkling into our affections with ‘The Stranger,’ Annie cooing cutely away while introducing some peculiar imagery, before the track lets loose with pent up distortion and beats in its final moments.  ‘Save Me From What I Want’ peaks into ‘The Neighbor,’ a brilliantly progressive track that just barely lets that tension rear its head… thus smartly toppling into single ‘Actor out of Work,’ the dismissiveness of its lyrics a fun juxtaposition for the toe-tapping nature of the track.  The middle of the album shuffles through these moods, trading daintier moments for pop or distortion, all fueled by thoughtfully composed songwriting.  But the album seems to end with the dark fairytale ‘The Bed,’ even pausing for a brief coda in the music… and then continuing on into a final trio of songs that feel like afterthoughts from the first album.  They’re still rewarding, they just don’t feel nearly as layered into the hills and valleys of what came before, and thus they blend together into pretty but standard tunes.  That the tracks before that are so cohesive and form a complete picture, though, is enough to keep you stirring in thought while these tracks play out.  Overall, St. Vincent hit the scene with a strong identity, and it absolutely became even more fortified on ‘Actor.’