The line between art and entertainment has always been fuzzy. Certainly, theres plenty of overlap between the two, but lately it feels like theres a growing divide, an ever-widening chasm separating our fundamental need for creative expression and our insatiable appetite for disposable content. Thats where T. Hardy Morris comes in.

Ive spent a lot of time parsing the difference between the two, he explains, not just for myself, but for society at large. What does it mean to be an artist? How do we measure creative success? Where are the boundaries between audience and performer when everyones broadcasting their lives 24/7?

Morris dives into those questions headfirst on his riveting new album, Artificial Tears, and while the answers dont come easily, the search yields plenty of reward. Recorded in Nashville with My Morning Jackets Carl Broemel at the helm, the collection is an electrifying work of existential exploration, a raw, rock and roll reflection on meaning and identity in a modern world thats simultaneously more connected and isolated than ever before. Despite the weighty ruminations at its core, the result is a remarkably grounded, down to earth album thats at once honest and abstract, a poignant, clear-eyed look in the mirror from a master craftsman committed to his work for nothing moreand nothing lessthan its own intrinsic value.