Perception Is/As/Of Deception

With Perception Is/As/Of Deception, Adult. remain masters of disorientation. As they did for their previous album This Behavior, Nicola Kuperus and Adam Lee Miller went to creative extremes to depict a world that seems to have shifted off its axis. Instead of sequestering themselves in a northern Michigan cabin, this time the duo stayed closer to home and made Perception in their windowless basement, which they transformed into a sensory deprivation chamber by painting it black. Creating, and then confronting, a void does seem to have heightened a few aspects of Adult.s music. Instead of This Behaviors abrasive starkness, on Perception Is/As/Of Deception the duo find liminal spaces within its negative space. On We Look Between Each Other, Kuperus creates moire patterns with her overlapping vocals as she sings We appear/We disappear over jittery, lunging, quintessentially Adult. beats and synths. The duo illustrate the albums motifs of suspicion, paranoia, and illusions brilliantly on Have I Started at the End, a Moebius loop of unsettling imagery (Yesterday, I appeared) set to a relentlessly whirring rhythm. Perception Is/As/Of Deceptions concept and sound are so cohesive that, like seeing patterns emerge after staring at the dark for too long, the changes Miller and Kuperus introduce from track to track stand out even more. The duo add some drama and perverse pleasure to the album with the tumbling, primal beat of Reconstruct the Construct and the decadent yet ominous synths piled onto Untroubled Mind. Theres also more range to Kuperus vocals than on some of Adult.s other albums; while shes sharp-edged and anguished as ever on Total Total Damage, which brings the albums concept front and center as she chants perception is deception, on the existential vortex Why Always Why, her voice takes on a sensuous quality thats arguably more startling. As always, the duo wring audacious sounds from their synths, whether they make them screech like robotic birds of prey on Second Nature or let them plummet and bounce around Kuperus as she snarls I cant comprehend this culture! on Controlled By. A skillful balance of Adult.s high concepts and kinetic rhythms, Perception Is/As/Of Deception reaffirms how the duo excel at finding creative ways to question society and art itself. ~ Heather Phares