Jeffrey Konrad's Shadow Boxing, his second "official" release under the name Konrad, is all over a pop map written mostly in crayon, with keyboard cheese and drum machines aplenty. If the album weren't so layered and carefully constructed, it would be an easy mistake to dismiss many songs as amateurish outsider art produced largely on a synthesizer.
The wrongheadedness of that should be evident solely from "Hang-Ups," which foregoes electronics entirely for a poignant, country-tinged ballad that recalls Neil Young in its instrumentation and sleepy vibe. The two-line chorus is plainspoken but clear, with understated vocals that capture a character both self-aware and lost: "Getting over you has been difficult / 'Cause I'm faking it through my future." The verses are loaded with phrases both cryptic and evocative - "Open season on the polygraph," "Shadow-boxing with the angel of death."
