Hi, everyone! Bigthony Scaretano here, the internet's busiest music nerd, and it's time for a review of this new Alex Cameron album, Late to Set.

Here we have a new record from Australian native Mr. Alex Cameron, his fifth full-length album. A record that, honestly, I was dreading a little bit originally, despite really having fallen in love with Alex's sound and his music through his breakout albums, namely 2017's Forced Witness. It's crazy to me to think at this point that record is almost ten years old, and how charming, funny, and insanely catchy it still is. Not only is this record such a great blend of synth and pop rock with a light nostalgic twist, but Alex's weirdo charisma is in full gear, with raspy croons and strange stories about the surliest characters you can imagine. I think to some, though, these in-character performances are read more like endorsements than condemnations.

So on the following Miami Memory, which I also enjoyed, Alex did a lot more to be authentic and make his true thoughts on love, manhood, political correctness, and even sex work crystal clear. These records were a great one-two punch, in my view, but like many musicians, Alex's transition into the 2020s was a little rough.

I think COVID, among other things, most likely impacted the quality of his next album, Oxy Music, which is only a few years old at this point, but that record still feels like a distant memory to me, despite it being Alex's most recent. I mean, still, there were a few moments in its tracklist that stuck with me, namely "K Hole," but that was just not enough to make up for my general issues with this album. Blander instrumentals, toned-down vocal performances, way less humor to speak of in the lyrics, and on top of all of that, it was easily Alex's weakest crop of songs, too. A real lack of punch in comparison with previous efforts, and I greatly feared we were in for a second helping of exactly that once the singles to this album started to hit the internet.

With the subtle production and slow-burn progressions of "Jesus Never Had No Porno" as well as "Statue Down," these songs, sadly, were just not really gripping me as teasers, and I found the rest of this album, upon first impressions, to be pretty low energy throughout.

But more than a month later, something was kind of itching at me, calling me back to this record, because I was really starting to question: could Alex really have swung and missed two times in a row? But now, after a long revisit with this record, I can definitively say he didn't. I think he bounces back, but it is a very gentle bounce back.

As Late to Set is maybe Alex's most nuanced offering so far, and I put a lot of that on him arranging the instrumentals on this album to have a kind of minimal synth-pop build. We have simple, repetitive, dusty, berry drum loops, lots of stiff guitar passages, synth chords and leads that are awash in atmosphere and reverb. It's a meager sonic recipe, similar to that of Oxy Music. But the difference is the progression, many of which are stunning, reaching some pretty awesome and gorgeous peaks. Whether it's the harmonized chants and woodwind melodies at the end of "No Soldier," or the haunting cacophony of strings, keys, and random percussive noises at the close of "No Guns Come Alone."

Now, there are still some tracks that I think could have used a little extra oomph, or some live drums, some punchier guitars, like "Jesus Never Had No Porno." As much as I appreciate the Velvet Underground's "Heroine," or hell, even "Jesus" type stillness and simplicity on this one. At least at the very start, the ill-defined layers of guitar and sax and keys that kinda grow and play the track out into oblivion - it's not the strongest finale for sure.

Then, "Stand-in Man" is the closest this album comes to delivering a rocker. Really could've been one of Alex's biggest singles if it actually went full tilt. So yeah, I don't know if simplifying everything to this degree was the most ideal move, but doing things in this way does at least enhance some of Late to Set's best moments, like "No Guns Come Alone," which I mentioned earlier, which sounds almost religious in tone with its hymn-inspired chord progression that's kind of built up with these heavenly layers.

And lyrically, this track is one of Alex's most insane and unhinged writing exercises ever. As he's singing from the standpoint of a kidnapper giving ransom instructions over the phone, presumably to fearful parents. And while, yeah, the song has so much detail it could merely be read at a surface level, I also wonder if there is an element of symbolism to this track. Thinking, what else could possibly have a hold of this kid? Maybe some other coercive force creating a disconnect between children and parents?

Then again, I also mentioned "No Soldier" earlier that I love too. It's a theatrical tone setter that, in a lot of ways, calls back to Alex's early days on his debut album, where he was famously singing in character as this failed television personality. Which, again, he's doing on this track, too, with allusions to being panned critically and acting. But this time, with Late to Set following his most unsuccessful album cycle yet, this narrative is more meta than it's ever been. As Alex describes himself as kind of soldiering through these lows, where he's just not being seen as a guy who's at his best. The show must go on, as they say, even if it's happening on the stage of an oddball pop auteur.

Beyond this, I will also say the singles on this record have certainly grown on me, too. I do love "Statue Down," with its rounded-off keys and percussion, topped with lyrics that are packed with perfect Cameronisms. I don't know what else to call them. Lyrically, this track is all about tearing down false idols, or names and faces, positions of power that we once held in high regard. But now their reputations and the reverence we once held is destroyed, because of a broken public trust. So now we have to tear the statue down. Which is effective enough, symbolically, but describing how we do that is where Alex shines, and also how we got there, too. As he makes reference to pedophilia and someone giving his daughter an STD. And in response to that, endorsing exile. 3D printing a guillotine.

I'm loving "Red Hook Rain," too, which I also want to mention in the same breath as Ricochet. They're different songs, but have similar 80's pop rock anthem vibes. And also have a very similar subject matter, too: breaking up. But at least with how Alex writes about it on these tracks, it feels like this happened as a result of an impasse of some sort, or life getting in the way and tearing these two people apart. And I consider it a testament to Alex's talent that he can make something that is so terrible, so awful, sound so completely cinematic and even desirable, on some level.

With "Red Hook Rain," it's like he almost loves having something to yearn for. My man is a yearner. He wants to have a memory to fold over in his mind. Something to miss.

They only see what they want to see, and never felt the thunder from the love that we made in the Red Hook Rain / You and me, we had a storm to chase, spinning around like two hurricanes / There ain't nobody to blame. Love is a weatherman's game.

Which is followed by a very emotional ending. And then with "Ricochet," again, a lot of similar moving parts. But there is an analogy kind of describing this separation. That being a bullet hitting some kind of wall and then bouncing off and flying in the other direction.

You can't predict the Ricochet / One of us is gonna run and the other one is gonna stay.

Though I will say, in the verses here, Alex doesn't exactly paint himself as a sympathetic character. Digging deeper, there are other cuts that, even if I do wish there was a bit more to them instrumentally, I do find them intriguing lyrically. Be it "Testosterone, in Blue," which is kind of like the most terrible role model you can imagine, setting the worst example. With an astrological tie-in to boot on the chorus.

Then with "Jesus Never Had No Porno," yes, obviously the track is about Jesus, but it also kind of paints his complete disconnect from the world that we currently exist in. That he has no frame of reference for some of the biggest things that we are aware of. That he has no frame of reference for some of the biggest things that we are aware of. Be they important, or be they silly. 9-11, COVID-19, or pizza, and of course, porno.

But still, despite this separation, people await Jesus' return as if he were the biggest rock star in the world. And I don't read this song as a religious endorsement or anything like that, but maybe more of an observation on the unique place that Jesus inhabits in the Western psyche.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention the closer, "Violent Man," which simply puts the point that this track is trying to make: silence equals violence, a lesson that some songwriters are learning the hard way right now. And Alex's description of that dynamic is very poetic, but also very interpersonal.

So again, while the idea is there, and I think the music is beautiful, certainly there is a nice little ascent that happens in this track compositionally in under four minutes. I was still left wanting a little bit more, be it through the structure or Alex just kind of diving into the broader implications. Of the idea of silence being violence. Or complicity in the face of something awful.

Still, with that being said, I did love the vast majority of what Alex offered on this record, even if it did take me some extra time and a few additional tries to actually really get it. I see this record, in a lot of ways, kind of accomplishing and really nailing down what he was attempting but couldn't quite complete on Oxy Music. While simultaneously returning to some old and familiar ideas from his first record and kind of bringing them back in a fun and entertaining way, like on "Stand-in Man," where Alex likens himself to a stand-in actor, but romantically speaking, being the guy who's ready to step in and be on call the moment that this person or anybody, I guess, kind of needs a man to call on. I'm feeling a light eight on this one.

Anthony Fantano. Alex Cameron. Forever.