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The Way Things Fall is an album that looked like it might never happen, because since the
release of Miller and his partner Nicola Kuperus' last record — 2007's Why Bother? — the
duo have been largely absent from the world of music. "After a long world tour, we totally
burnt out," Miller relates. "We decided we wanted to do something completely different."
That something was a trilogy of films entitled the Three Grace(s) triptych, completed in
2010, along with a variety of other pursuits, including managing a major commercial
renovation and working on their visual art projects.
When Miller and Kuperus re-entered the studio in 2012, there was no intention of making
another album — they planned to record a 12" containing two new songs they'd written in
2012 for their return to live performance at the Detroit Museum of Contemporary Art. But it
turned out that the time away from music had recharged ADULT.'s batteries, and then some.
"We were apparently a dam that was ready to break," says Miller. "We were writing
frantically, as if in a frenzy."
The result is a record that sounds both focused and coherent, flowing with a conceptual
ease. "[The album] flowed efficiently and agreeably for us," says Miller. "We have never
worked better together. We believe this is because we exorcised all of our demons through
our past records, we have no baggage, we started anew. We left behind the self-conscious
adolescents." And indeed, ADULT. have never sounded so self-assured, so poised, and so
vital.
The songs are some of the most memorable the band have recorded — Miller describes
them as "the closest we have to come to writing traditional 'pop' songs, even though we
know they are totally mutants," and he's right on both fronts. From the whiplash synth lines
of the opening "Heartbreak" to the ship's bell sample that closes the record, the songs are
full of the sort of memorably twisted melodies we've come to expect from the band.
Analogue sounds predominate, and notably, there's no bass guitar at all: "This wasn't a
conscious decision, but something realized at the end of the process."
The lyrics address issues that Miller describes as "personal and universal," illustrating
themes of relationship-related fear and doubt with striking and occasionally surrealist
imagery — "Nothing Lasts" finds Kuperus claiming "I can see in your mouth/ Down into your
throat/ Straight to your heart/ Tears me apart", while the somber "A Day Like Forever"
deploys images of time stretching and disappearing, and "Tonight, We Fall" describes
feelings as tangible objects that "stick to you, stick to me." The contrast between the
reflective lyricism and the squelching analogue synth textures they inhabit creates music
that's both deeply heartfelt and viscerally thrilling, something that's been a constant feature
of ADULT.'s work over the years.