Always the Master of Unusual Things, this time Andrew Jackson has created an album that is both spoken narrative and funky, layered retro-electronica punctuated by his singularly magnetic guitar. The Ubiquitous They is comprised not of tracks but rather of chapters that flow from one to the next. The introduction, Beauty Unleashed, is cool, dark and oddly nasty. Momentum builds in Don’t Think, hurtling us forward into a world seething with desperate people and rush hour madness - and then Jackson’s staccato anger steps, without a break, into Heart Goes Black. In fact, it can be difficult to separate the songs of this album one from another because they all seem to be part of a continuing dark monologue Jackson is having, railing at a world mired in denial and self-gratification. Yet each song, though woven closely with the one that came before, has its unique place, and Jackson’s talent is to get into your head - in some cases, quite literally. Listen to Some Future Me on headphones: that’s him, crawling through your brain from ear to ear, sometimes far away in the distant reaches of your skull, other times nestling right between your eyes. He sings, but most often on this album Jackson is in rap/chant mode. It puts the emphasis on his lyrics, his voice becoming an instrument of percussion, sounding out his poetry atop the synth and guitar that underlie it. This is especially true of the hissing outrage of Deja Vudu, the song that was the catalyst for this album. Gag Reflex, the next song, might almost be Deja’s chorus. In the last two songs, Troubled Soul and The You You Are, Jackson allows us more guitar and sings us out. There is a Bowie-esque theatricality about The You You Are; the circus is in town, and as we exit the midway, we leave behind a crowd of spectators and the lonely notes of a calliope. Jackson has ushered us from the Big Top, and we find ourselves in silence outside tent flaps. But then, we can go back whenever we want. That’s what replay is for.