After decades of silence, The The returns with one of the most interesting, thought-provoking, introspective releases of the group's career. This is an album that not only deserves your full attention — it commands it.

The The will forever be the hardest band name to Google, but if you do find them, you can rest with a surety that you’re in the know. Since 1980, The The has been singer Matt Johnson’s only moniker, and the group has featured a long list of ever-changing musicians in the lineup. While 1982’s Soul Mining has been widely praised as a masterpiece, 1992’s Dusk is one of my all-time favorite albums, with “Love is Stronger Than Death” and “Lonely Planet” being what I would consider to be two of the best songs ever made.

After 2001’s NakedSelf, the lights went out on The The. Until now. That’s right, we got a new album from The The before GTA 6. 

If you were to resurrect yourself, what would you open with? We’ve seen it in countless films with corny lines and marketable slogans, but Matt’s unmistakably twisted baritone croon steps out of the shadows with no signs of aging. He begins, “Servile - surveilled; dumbed down - curtailed; screen-grabbed - down-ranked; Un-tagged - de-banked.” That’s a lot of ground to cover before we’re thirty seconds in. “Cognitive Dissident” reads more like a college thesis than a pop song, but it’s more interesting than either. 

“Life After Life” is the climax of the album. Brought to you by the official lounge band of purgatory, it’s potentially the most intensely thought-provoking song I’ve ever heard.

Each lyric could be meditated on, but the song revolves around the questions, “Are there things you should’ve said, but didn’t say (life after life)? Are there things you should’ve done, but didn’t do (life after life)? Remembering where you were before you were you.” I’m sorry if you didn’t expect such a philosophical deep dive when you decided to read this, but that’s exactly why it excites me. It’s soul-searching self-expression. It’s reaching beyond what’s understood and it left me reaching as well. 

The instrumentation on the album revolves around a guitar, bass, drum trio with a host of other guests including some strings, synths, ethereal eerie textures, and an occasional backing vocalist or three. Having to fill in the shoes of Johnny Marr and other incredible guitarists who came before him, Barrie “Little Barrie” Cadogen sounds right at home as part of the lineup on this record. In addition to the dozen or so very beautifully voiced guitar parts, he co-wrote “Cognitive Dissident” and “I Hope You Remember (what I can’t forget).” Barrie’s contributions to the album can’t be understated. His sensibilities add such a depth to help make this one of the most interesting albums The The have. 

The last three tracks are some of Matt Johnson’s most introspective, gentle songs to date, but I fear they won’t be heard by a sizable portion of listeners before they reach the conclusion of the story. Some listeners (not you), might find the album a bit long for being so far off the traditional mark. “Too much spoken word with doctorate level vocabulary.” I can hear them saying it now. And they’re wrong!

Ensoulment is a fantastic return from a cult classic group that seemed gone for good. It’s both a dark pop-up storybook outlook on civilization and a disturbed puppet show about questioning mortality and the eternal nature of the soul. This is an album meant to be turned on and listened to with the listeners full attention, and it deserves just that. With all that in mind,

“Some things are best experienced, not explained.”

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