Heavy Rotation: Father John Misty - I Love You, Honeybear

 

To say I am a little enamored with Josh Tillman’s new masterpiece of unadulterated romantic idealism armored in literate, silver-tongued, cynical ire against the pedestrian, mega-churched, oblivious masses just beyond the walls, like contagious, bloodthirsty wolves at the door, of FJ Misty and his new Honeybear bride would be an understatement on par with saying most Americans seem to kind of enjoy cholesterol-soaked 99-cent cheeseburgers, cable news pundits, and Facebook memes.

Over a seamless span of 11 grandly produced, no-holds-barred songs rooted in love and optimism in the face of end of days bleakness (“Fuck the world damn straight my lady / It may be just us who feel this way / But don’t ever doubt this, my steadfast conviction: My love, you’re the one I want to watch the ship go down with,” Misty declares right up front within minute one), Tillman takes stock of all the carnage (global market crashes, fundamentalism, retirement homes, sexual inadequacy, rampant pharmacopeia, white girls singing with faux-soul affectations) in ornately detailed precision, and steadfastly determines a chance meeting in a store parking lot with the woman he’d come to love swayed the balance of his entire existence and all the future generations he’s spinning in his head.

Or at least that’s the tapestry he’s telling.

 

Before we ever get near that point, Tillman lovingly sings of a first night of intimacy and falling in love (“First time you let me stay the night despite your own rules, you took off early to go cheat your way through film school. You left a note in your perfect script: ‘Stay as long as you want.’ And I haven’t left your bed since.”) punctuated with a swell of mariachi horns and swooning strings (“Chateau Lobby #4 (in C for Two Virgins)”), romantic disillusionment with an unknown woman who nearly died in his bathtub (“Strange Encounter”), a barn-burning, napalm-spewing takedown of narcissistic 21^st manhood and its unavoidable reckoning with trying to sell a partner of its newfound stability (“The Ideal Husband”), and a double-barreled, bare bones-and-piano-or-guitar pair of alternately heartbreaking and lyrically virtuosic ballads (“Bored in the U.S.A.”, “Holy Shit”) that feel like Misty is reinventing the wheel of what rock or pop or folk music can be and truly is light years ahead of most contemporaries in each facet.

However you care to classify Father John Misty at this point, he is unrivaled. Cue the maniacal, closing laugh track of “Bored in the U.S.A.” and listen intently.

 

It’s a satirical juggernaut and should come off as little more than a gimmick. So why does is sting so deeply? How can it be laugh out loud hilarious when it’s somber and painful? How does Misty burrow right down into the bones with that soulful howl after singing, “They gave me a useless education. A subprime loan. A Craftsman home. Keep my prescriptions filled. Now, I can’t get off. But I can kind of deal?” They’re all dazzling, deft maneuvers and are immaculately arranged, and they resonate because he’s taking the piss out of it all but he’s also deadly serious. That dichotomy is the skeleton key to I Love You, Honeybear’s magnetism. Tillman’s lyrical executions (pun certainly intended) buzzsaw down to the bone across the board with an intellectual ingenuity and acerbic wit that maybe hasn’t been exposed this readily and impressively in serious rock music since arguably (cue the inter-generational firing squad) Blonde on Blonde, aka still one of the greatest albums ever written and recorded. Obviously, I’m not naïve or prone to enough hyperbole to come right out and say Father John Misty has recorded possibly one of the TRULY GREAT albums after just a few weeks of listening to it, but I, for one, sure as hell won’t be surprised if I Love You, Honeybear stands the test of time and holds it own against some of those titans in the years to come.

I Love You, Honeybear is out now (released February 10) via Sub Pop Records.

 

 

*Bonus: My favorite barbed-wire takedowns and lyrical executions from I Love You, Honeybear:

“Love is just an institution based on human frailty. What’s your paradise got to do with Adam and Eve? Maybe love is just an economy based on resource scarcity, but what I fail to see is what that’s got to do with you and me.” (“Holy Shit”)

“She says, like, literally music is the air she breathes. And the malapropos make me wanna fucking scream. I wonder if she even knows what that word means. Well, it’s literally not that.” (“The Night Josh Tillman Came to Our Apt.”)

 “Oh I just love the kind of woman who can walk all over a man, I mean like a goddamn marching band.” (“The Night Josh Tillman Came to Our Apt.”)

 “Of all the things I hate about her one is her petty vogue ideals. Somebody’s been told one too many times they’re beyond their years by every halfwit of distinction she keeps around, and now every insufferable convo features her patiently explaining the cosmos, of which she is in the middle.” (The Night Josh Tillman Came to Our Apt.”)

“No one ever knows the real you and life is brief. So I’ve heard, but what’s that got to do with this black hole inside of me?” (“Holy Shit”)

“My baby does something way more impressive than the Georgia crawl. She blackens pages like a Russian Romantic and gets down more often than a blowup doll.” (“Nothing Good Ever Happens At the Goddamn Thirsty Crow”)

“How many people rise and think, ‘Oh good. The stranger’s body is still here. Our arrangement hasn’t changed?’ Now I’ve got a lifetime to consider all the ways I’ve grown more disappointing to you as my beauty warps and fades. I suspect you feel the same.” (“Bored in the U.S.A.”)

 “Why the long face, blondie? I’m already taken. Sorry. I may act like a lunatic, but if you think I’m fucking crazy, you’re mistaken.” (“Nothing Good Ever Happens At the Goddamn Thirsty Crow”)

“You’re bent over the altar and the neighbors are complaining. Bet the misanthropes next door are probably conceiving a Damien.” (“I Love You, Honeybear”)

“I know it’s hard to believe a good-hearted woman could have a body that’d make your daddy cry. Why the long face, jerkoff? Your chance has been taken. Good one. You may think like an animal, but if you try that cat and mouse shit, you’ll get bitten. Keep moving.” (“Nothing Good Ever Happens At the Goddamn Thirsty Crow”)

“By this afternoon, I’ll live in debt; by tomorrow, be replaced by children.” (“Bored in the U.S.A.”)

 “We sang ‘Silent Night’ in three parts, which was fun…’til she said she sounds just like Sarah Vaughn. I hate that soulful affectation white girls put on. Why don’t you move to the Delta? I obliged later on when you begged me to choke ya.” (“The Night Josh Tillman Came to Our Apt.”)

“Just one Cadillac will do to get us out to where we’re going. I’ve brought my mother’s depression, you’ve got your father’s scorn and a wayward aunt’s schizophrenia.” (“I Love You, Honeybear”)

“I came over at seven in the morning, seven in the morning, seven in the morning. Said something dumb like, ‘I’m tired of running.’ Let’s put a baby in the oven. Wouldn’t I make the ideal husband?” (“The Ideal Husband”)

“Honeybear, Honeybear, your mascara, blood, ash and cum on the Rorshach sheets were we make love” (“I Love You, Honeybear”)

“Everything is due and nothing will be spared, but I love you, Honeybear.” (“I Love You, Honeybear”)

“First time you let me stay the night despite your own rules, you took off early to go cheat your way through film school. You left a note in your perfect script: Stay as long as you want. And I haven’t left your bed since.” (“Chateau Lobby #4 (In C for Two Virgins)”)

“I want to take you in the kitchen. Lift up your wedding dress someone was probably murdered in. So bourgeoisie to keep waiting. Dating for 20 years just feels pretty civilian.” (“Chateau Lobby #4 (In C for Two Virgins)”)