Big Mess is Elfman's first solo album in more than thirty years, but it's no return to normalcy.
With 18 tracks, this sprawling and ambitious double album allows the Grammy and Emmy Award-winning composer
to break new ground as a songwriter and performer, drawing on a dystopian palette of distorted electric guitars,
industrial synthesizers, and orchestras to exorcise the demons spawned by four years of creeping fascism and
civil decay. The songs recall everything from Nine Inch Nails to David Bowie to XTC, balancing dense,
harmonically complex arrangements with a biting and acerbic wit, all while confronting the chaos and confusion
of the modern world. Elfman wrote almost the entire album during quarantine, and while the anger, frustration,
and isolation of it all are palpable in his discourse, Big Mess is far more than just an outlet.