Harry Connick Jr. - Every Man Should Know

Now we'll jump the better part of 2 decades later and open his 2013 album Every Man Should Know. You have the assurance that Harry wrote all the music and lyrics himself, and they didn't even fire up the autotune plugin.

It's a musical journey down a back road of Harry's desire. It's gonna be a bunch of pop-jazz ballads. Everybody gave it a mildly bad review, but I expect it will be quite nice. Let's go for a walk.

Well, the first 4 tracks are fantastic. Yes, he's genre hopping, but they actually flow like consecutive thoughts. You could actually have these thoughts in that order with the associated mood portrayed in the music. 

Then it breaks. Come See About Me is stylistically fine, but irreconcilable with the previous 4 songs. Then we go all over the place.

Ok, i think i see why people don't get it. This isn't a pop album or a jazz album, it really is a concept album. It's not a story per se, but a series of situational experiences. It's not a linear album even though large portions actually flow quite well. Love and loneliness are the central themes, and the contextualizations of each song explore how those themes manifest both lyrically and musically. That's tough to engage with because all the actual work takes place in between the songs, so to speak. You have to let go of the sense of control you want from the sequencing. The concept of a solitary walk through the alleys of your mind is a good concept for that. He's thinking of a particular experience (real or imagined) that popped into his head and expressing that complete experience in song. Obviously it's not his last album ever, but it ends like it is because that's where the solitary walk through reminiscence leads.

You might disagree with me, but this is actually a fantastic album and every song is wonderful. It's properly bookended as a coherent experience, the songs are good both in and out of that context, and i'm certainly not left with the feeling that listening to it was a waste of time. Shock and awe, Bottle says this is awesome. Go check it out.