Marc Almond's 2017 album finds the former Soft Cell frontman still mining the shadows of twentieth-century song, his weathered baritone wrapping itself around classics with the theatrical intensity that's defined his solo years.

Following decades of channeling French chanson and cabaret's darker corners, Almond approaches these standards as emotional archaeology, unearthing the melancholy and camp beneath familiar surfaces. It's interpretative work that refuses nostalgia's easy comfort, instead insisting that old songs contain multitudes when sung by someone who understands longing as both performance and truth.