Eels - Tomorrow Morning

Mark "E" Everett has had a pretty tough life. Anyone who read his 2006 autobiography Things The Grandchildren Should Know can attest to that.

Tomorrow Morning completes a trilogy of Eels records that started with the "12 songs of desire" of last year's Hombre Lobo and continued with this year's End Times, which was focused on the cheery subject of loss. End Times, in particular was a pretty difficult album to live with due to its subject matter, but to describe it as "misanthropic and boring" is pretty harsh for someone who's been through what Everett has (I'm looking at you Pitchfork).

So the focus for this new record? Redemption. And it's pretty clear thar Everett's life is on the upswing at the moment, as he screams "My baby LOVES me!!!" on the song of the same name. What I Have To Offer sees him listing a few of his better attributes to a prospective partner, somehow managing to still sound careworn while singing "For all the wear and tear, I look OK, I got good manners and I make a good pay".

This Is Where It Gets Good, at 6 minutes, stands as the centrepiece of the record. It pulls together a lot of the musical waypoints of the album - programmed drums, ornate strings, mellow electric piano, all pulled together by E's worn out husk of a voice. The final 4 minutes of the song are instrumental, the electronic drums building up and deconstructing repeatedly, as if to represent E trying to pick himself up but failing and trying again and again.

There's a fantastic childishness to the way Everett writes, throwing in different styles all over the record - delicate instrumental interludes (After The Earthquake), 8 bit electronica (Baby Loves Me), even gospel (Looking Up). The record doesn't quite hit the heights of his previous work (Beautiful Freak, the glorious double album Blinking Lights) but completes a trilogy that sees Everett stand at a new crossroads in his musical career. Where will he take himself next?

7/10