Yet Sweet perversely still reaches for the mainstream, demonstrating melodic craft at its finest, with hooks and harmonies to help bring lightness to the ache. And though his lyrics have an overtly apocalyptic tone, Sweet’s dark sense of humor does creep through. After all, here’s an album that begins by declaring “It’s raining men, hallelujah...” and then finishes the image by describing such men jumping from roofs with their bodies popping on the ground as they hit.

On paper, this is tough stuff then. But the sound is something entirely more palatable. Sweet sings in a sultry low voice that could be coming from right next to you, with elocution and crispness (especially on the delicate “Song to Keep Me Still”) not unlike Snow Patrol’s Gary Lightbody prior to his days as a soulless stadium mimic. But the artistic approach here is far more in line with Radiohead, conveying some extremely dark themes (“One fine day we’ll leave this place black and burning, laid to waste”) in a way that plays both beautiful and alluring. [More Radiohead comparisons: opener “Fiery the Angels Fell” is especially reminiscent of “Knives Out”; “Between the Palisades and the Firmament” a dead ringer for “Pearly”; and “Long Divider” demonstrative of the warm coating of sound that defines In Rainbows.

Frequent moments also call to mind the claustrophobic, heroin-heavy era of Nine Inch Nails, such as the Quake soundtrack (“Whither Thou Goest, Cretin”) or The Downward Spiral. Even the album’s anthemic high point, “Everyone Will Let You Down in the End,” seems to take cues from “Hurt” in its full-bodied exploration of rawness and dynamics. But such parallels are clearly deliberate. Sweet’s previous work as Boduf Songs  perfected the art of intoning apocalyptic messages over gentler soundscapes, and he took that sound as far as it could go. The decision to now cloak such visions in somewhat harrowing production is a bold move—auteuristic with a capital A—amalgamating broader, more recognizable influences into something that was already wholly his. Somehow this material succeeds not in spite of its darkness but because of it, and one only has to look at these most obvious forebears to see what approach he’s taking to court an audience.

Even the title of the album itself is a perverted take on the concept of “atmosphere,” demonstrating both a philosophy and a sardonic wit. And atmosphere, again, is certainly the key to this release. From the humming backwards harmonics and waves of guitar on “Between the Palisades...” to the absolute weirdness of “Drexelius Sick Man Quarles Emblemes Closed Heaven,” built upon a synthy morse-code pulse and spacy vocoded girl-like vocals that are equal parts Kraftwerk and Grimes, it’s difficult to understand exactly why this music is so approachable. And then during the space junk epilogue of “Oh My Overlord,” it all comes together: the atmosphere. Thick, gorgeous, and dangerously immersive, Sweet’s songs enable life and coddle darkness at the same time.