''Uniform Distortion'' is the third

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track cartridge, 8-track or Cassette tape, cassette), or digital distribution, dig ...

by American musician and lead vocalist of

My Morning Jacket My Morning Jacket is an American Rock music, rock band formed in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1998. The band consists of vocalist/guitarist Jim James, bassist Tom Blankenship, drummer Patrick Hallahan, guitarist Carl Broemel, and keyboardist Bo Kos ...

Jim James James Edward Olliges Jr. (born April 27, 1978), professionally known as Jim James or Yim Yames, is an American vocalist, guitarist, producer, and primary songwriter of the rock band My Morning Jacket. He has also released several solo albums. ...

. It was released on June 29, 2018 under

ATO Records ATO Records (or According to Our Records) is an American independent record label based in New York City. The label was established in 2000 by Dave Matthews and manager Coran Capshaw. ATO's roster includes My Morning Jacket, Brittany Howard, ...

Production

Jim James explained the inspiration for the album came from the 1970s magazine

Whole Earth Catalog The ''Whole Earth Catalog'' (WEC) was an American counterculture magazine and product catalog published by author Stewart Brand several times a year between 1968 and 1972, and occasionally thereafter, until 1998. The magazine featured essays ...

. Inside the magazine was a photograph titled "Illuminated Man" by

Duane Michals Duane Michals ( "Michaels"; born February 18, 1932) is an American photographer. Michals's work makes innovative use of photo-sequences, often incorporating text to examine emotion and philosophy. Education and career Michals's interest in ar ...

, which James used for the album cover. James wrote a letter to Duane in the hope he could use the photograph for the album. The album was produced by James and Kevin Ratterman at La La Land studio in

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville is the List of cities in Kentucky, most populous city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, sixth-most populous city in the Southeastern United States, Southeast, and the list of United States cities by population, 27th-most-populous city ...

Release

On April 17, 2018, Jim James announced the release of his third studio album, along with the first music video for "Just a Fool". The single was performed live on

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert ''The Late Show with Stephen Colbert'' is an American late-night talk show, late-night news satire, news and liberal political satire talk show hosted by Stephen Colbert, which premiered on September 8, 2015. Produced by Stephen Colbert, Spartin ...

on May 24, 2018. The second single "Throwback" was released on May 31, 2018.

Critical reception

''Uniform Distortion'' was met with "generally favorable" reviews from critics. At

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 ...

, which assigns a weighted average rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, this release received an

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

score of 77, based on 17 reviews. Aggregator Album of the Year gave the release a 76 out of 100 based on a critical consensus of 18 reviews. Thom Jurek of ''

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 ...

'' praised the album by saying: "The songs are wonderfully hooky tomes about self-reflection with societal jeremiads woven through. While it may not be any easier to make one's way through the distortion that James references, it is somehow easier to bear because of the empathy, joy, and contradiction in these songs." Owen Torrey of ''

Exclaim ''Exclaim!'' is a Canadian music and entertainment publisher based in Toronto, which features coverage of new music across all genres with a special focus on Canadian and emerging artists. The monthly ''Exclaim!'' print magazine publishes seven ...

'' said that the album "shears off some of the unrulier arrangements of James' earlier solo material, in favour of structures that emphasize immediacy and intensity. For the most part, the album is distinctly nostalgic in sound, chock full of sugary backing vocals, driving rhythms and splayed guitar lines." Oliver Kuscher from ''

The Line of Best Fit ''The Line of Best Fit'' is an independent online magazine based in London, concentrating on new music. It publishes independent music reviews, features, interview, and media. Founded by Richard Thane in February 2007 and currently edited by P ...

'' explained the album "may be the most straightforward sounding a set of Jim James songs has ever released, but they’ve somehow absorbed the distortion of today’s world and turned it into something we can all make sense of, and in which we can seek some solace."

Track listing

Personnel

Musicians *

– primary artist, producer, mixing * Jamie Drake – backing vocals * Kathleen Grace – backing vocals * Leslie Stevens – backing vocals * Seth Kaufman – bass * David Givan – drums Production *

Bob Ludwig Robert Carl Ludwig (born December 11, 1944), is a retired American mastering engineer. He mastered recordings on all the major recording formats for all the major record labels, and on projects by more than 1,300 artists, including Led Zeppeli ...

– mastering * Kevin Ratterman – engineer, producer

Charts

References

External links

Uniform Distortion
at

* * {{Authority control 2018 albums Jim James albums ATO Records albums