''Perfect Vision'' is the eighth solo album by

Thalia Zedek Thalia Zedek (born 1961) is an American singer and guitarist. Active since the early 1980s, she has been a member of several notable alternative rock groups, including Live Skull and Uzi (band), Uzi both of which, according to ''Spin (magazine) ...

, released on August 27, 2021, three years after ''

Fighting Season ''Fighting Season'' is a 2018 Australian television drama series that screened on Foxtel's Showcase (Australian TV channel), Showcase channel. The series is a mystery involving Australian soldiers returning on leave from deployment in Afghanistan ...

''.

Background

Released by

Thrill Jockey Thrill Jockey is an American independent record label established by former Atlantic Records A&R representative Bettina Richards and based in Chicago. History Richards started the label in 1992 with $35,000 of family and personal capital, while ...

on August 27, 2021, three years after her previous solo album ''

'', ''Perfect Vision'' was recorded in late 2020 to early 2021 at Machines with Magnets, in

Pawtucket, Rhode Island Pawtucket ( ) is a city in Providence County, Rhode Island, United States. The population was 75,604 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making the city the fourth-largest in the state. Pawtucket borders Providence, Rhode Island, Prov ...

. Zedek's fifth solo album to be credited to the Thalia Zedek Band, ''Perfect Vision'' was recorded and mixed by producer Seth Manchester and

mastered Mastering is a form of audio post production which is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device called a master recording, the source from which all copies will be ...

by Sarah Register. Whilst the material in Zedek's previous album ''Fighting Season'' "was written leading up to and following the 2016 U.S. elections", which contributed to the political themes of many of its songs, Zedek and Manchester finished working on ''Perfect Vision'' on January 6, 2021, as the

United States Capitol The United States Capitol, often called the Capitol or the Capitol Building, is the Seat of government, seat of the United States Congress, the United States Congress, legislative branch of the Federal government of the United States, federal g ...

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

was being violently attacked by a mob of supporters of President

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...

, resulting again in an album that is at points not only overtly political but one that, as Jared Dix reviewing it for ''Echoes and Dust'' states, "may even be angrier than the last album, ''Fighting Season''". "Tolls" features fellow

artist

Alison Chesley Alison Chesley (born January 4, 1960), known also by her stage name Helen Money, is a Chicago-based cellist and composer. Chesley was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. She moved to Chicago to attend Northwestern University, where she ...

, also known as Helen Money, on cello and piano.

Critical reception

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, the album has a weighted average score of 71 out of 100, based on four critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Jennifer Kelly, in her review of the album for ''Dusted'' magazine, declared that ''Perfect Vision'', " ke all f Zedek'sworks, ..exudes a brute, persistent strength that will not yield, no matter what happens". Kelly then went on to state that " healbum presents an artist who has had all the time life affords to figure out how she wants to sound and all the support that long-time collaborators can bring to realizing her ideas. Every sound fits, without sounding in the least bit fussed over or premeditated."

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

's review of the album, penned by Mark Deming, suggested that " en more than ''Fighting Season'', ''Perfect Vision'' is art that offers a hard but honest look at the world and the times that gave it life, and its evocative power will still speak clearly long after other crises have replaced those keeping Zedek awake in 2021."

Track listing

Personnel

Thalia Zedek Band *

– electric guitars, vocals * Winston Braman – bass guitar * David Michael Curry – viola * Gavin McCarthy – drums Additional musicians * Mel Lederman – piano on "Binoculars" * Brian Carpenter – trumpet on "From the Fire" * Karen Sarkisian –

pedal steel guitar The pedal steel guitar is a console steel guitar with pedals and knee levers that change the pitch of certain strings, enabling more varied and complex music to be played than with other steel guitar designs. Like all steel guitars, it can play ...

on "Cranes" *

– cello and piano on "Smoked" and "Tolls" Production * Thalia Zedek – front cover photo * Heather Kapplow – back cover photo * Dan Zedek – design * Seth Manchester –

recording A record, recording or records may refer to: An item or collection of data Computing * Record (computer science), a data structure ** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity ** Boot sector or boot record, re ...

and mixing * Sarah Register – mastering

References

{{Authority control Thalia Zedek albums Blues rock albums by American artists 2021 albums Albums produced by Seth Manchester