Hey Dweller, based on your fave records of his I'd recommend checking "Liars" out. Healer and Acapella are also two of my faves (along with The Ballad of, Something/Anything, a Wizard a True Star, The first Nazz album, etc) and I like Swing to the Right too. Like you, I got to the point over the last ten years where I reluctantly wrote him off as washed up, but Liars proved me wrong and I'm very happy about that. It's definitely up there with some of his best. The instrumentation does have something in common with his 90s work (mostly No World Order) on certain songs, but the songs are superior to anything since Nearly Human or earlier. The songs and lyrics are very strong and the album ties together, conceptually, in a way that his haven't since the 80s.
I do think he could use a co-producer to offset his more extreme tendencies at times, but the album is strong enough to make me overlook those moments. And yes...like many of his past albums, the cover is silly and not at all representative of the content (the Japanese import has a more suitable cover). I believe Mojo magazine gave it 5 stars and I might agree. It's his best in decades and my favorite album of the year (so far anyway).
Phil
I do think he could use a co-producer to offset his more extreme tendencies at times, but the album is strong enough to make me overlook those moments. And yes...like many of his past albums, the cover is silly and not at all representative of the content (the Japanese import has a more suitable cover). I believe Mojo magazine gave it 5 stars and I might agree. It's his best in decades and my favorite album of the year (so far anyway).
Phil