The second of three entries by the front man of the Arctic Monkeys, Alex Turner, and solo artist, Miles Kane (also known as The Last Shadow Puppets) was finally released 8 years after their debut album together. Everything You’ve Come to Expect is the complete and utter opposite of its name. But first, a short history.

The Last Shadow Puppets were formed on tour when the Arctic Monkeys and the Little Flames—Kane was the frontman for this band at the time—were on tour in 2005. Turner and Kane spent a lot of time writing and performing songs during the tour, and in 2007 began recording their first album. It took quickly spending six weeks on the UK Album Charts and peaking at number nine on the chart.

After The Age of the Understatement (2008), the band went silent for a while since both Turner and Kane were working on their own projects. That is, until December 2015, when the band released 2 teaser trailers, and then, in early 2016, videos for the tracks “Bad Habits”, “Aviation” and the title song from EYCTE. They returned with the same sound as the first album with influences from early David Bowie music and Scott Walker; that, in combination with a 15-piece orchestral accompaniment, an organ, a celeste, a harpsichord and a collage of other obscure instruments, TLSP get a sound that can only be described as baroque pop.

Contrary to most people’s opinions (Metacritic, Pitchfork and The Guardian, to name a few) I thought this album was really sensational, interesting and overall an impressive piece of art. The fact that they used more instruments than just guitars, a bass, drums and vocals makes the album appealing on its own, but what really distinguishes it is the blend of sound that it has from both the 60s pop era and the modern alternative rock scene. That, intertwined with the classical sound from the miniature orchestra, combines to make a sound that really is not really found among the pop or alternative rock scenes.

On a similar note of their uniqueness, the music videos. But not for a good reason. The video for the song, “Everything You’ve Come to Expect”, features a woman in bridal clothing, dancing around Turner and Kane, who are buried up to their necks in sand, on a beach. It ends with the woman running off into the distance towards a silhouette of a man and Turner and Kane being almost completely submerged as the tide comes in. Interpret it as ‘just their style’, or whatever, but I think one of two things happened; 1) there were a lot of drugs, or 2) it was their last ditch attempt to get a video out before the album was released.

About now, the few of you who have watched the music videos are saying, ‘Well that’s not fair to say; the “Aviation” music video explains how they got buried.’ Not really. Yes, it features Kane and Turner digging the hole that they are buried in “Everything You’ve Come to Expect”. They are eventually tied up and buried after Kane kisses the James Bond-esque villain that is in the video without explanation. And, of course, the woman in bridal clothing runs away from said villain, but it fails to explain how the video is connected to the song itself. The “Aviation” video really only supplies ‘exposition’ for the first video, and the exposition only makes the first video more confusing. It may just be me, but I fail to see the relevance that the videos have to the songs.

However, once you get past the off-the-wall music videos, EYCTE is overall a excellent album . It is a nice change of gear from most music around today and it is truly well composed and well put together. So, go and buy the album through whatever source you wish, and (indirectly) give these people money for the work they put into this.

The Parkway West Pathfinder Gives “Everything You’ve Come to Expect” a 9.7/10.