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RonSexsmith is a major contemporary writer/artist who has amassed asizable and consistently enthralling body of work since making hismajor label debut in 1995 with his self-titled album on Interscope,followed by such eloquent musical gems as Other Songs (1997), Blue Boy (2001), Retriever (2004) and Time Being(2006). Each has its own particular character but is connected to therest by the overarching intelligence, impeccable taste and understatedemotionality of this single-minded voice in the pop-culturalwilderness. As one new fan put it in a comment on iTunes, Sexsmith'smusic “wins you over with a silk punch.” Well put.

On his ninth album, the cagily titled Exit Strategy of the Soul(with an emphasis on the last word of this provocative phrase),Sexsmith once again brings a provocative new wrinkle to his expansiveaesthetic. Informed but not entrapped by soul and gospel music,ornamented by a Cuban horn section and his own gorgeously imperfectpiano playing, the album achieves a sort of metaphysical dimensionwhile maintaining breathtaking intimacy.

Working once again with Swedish-born, London-based producer Martin Terefe, who brought a burnished, Beatlesque lilt to Retriever,the artist finds an unexpected sweet spot in a stylistic and thematicrealm he calls “shadow gospel.” It's in full flower on such memorablesongs as the horn-drenched “This Is How I Know,” the aching “HardTimes,” the playful 'Brandy Alexander' (his first recorded co-writewith fellow Canadian Leslie Feist) and the buoyantly humanistic“Brighter Still.” Exit Strategy is framed by a pair ofevocative instrumentals redolent of Randy Newman's film music,“Spiritude” and “Dawn Anna.” It wouldn't be an overstatement to saythat these 14 songs not only encompass the gamut of human emotions butdo so with psychological acuity and plainspoken poetic grace.

The album finds Sexsmith at his most soulful—not that he sounds likeAl Green. “I don't have that kind of voice,” he acknowledges,unnecessarily. “'This Is How I Know' was the first song I wrote for therecord,” says Sexsmith, “and it felt to me kind of like a gospel tune.As I continued writing, I started getting this vibe that there was aspiritual element to them. One song, ‘Poor Helpless Dreams,' predatesmy first record; I tried recording it over the years and never got aversion I was happy with, but lyrically it seemed to fit in with thesenew ones. ‘Brighter Still' was lyrically very positive, and I felt therecord needed that kind of song, which is sort of in a Bill Withersmode.” He pauses for an aside. “I keep hoping he'll make another recordsomeday.”

None of it was premeditated. “When Martin and I go in the studio, we don't want to repeat ourselves,” says Sexsmith. “Retrieverwas a straight-ahead, '60-style pop album, and in a way this one iseven more old-fashioned and rough. But the plan this time was to nothave a plan. At the heart of it is some very questionable piano playingby me. The last bunch of records have been mostly written on piano, butwhen I'm working with Mitchell [From, the keyboard-playing veteran whoproduced Sexsmith's three Interscope album's and the previous Time Being],I don't really have the nerve to play in front of him. With Martin, I'dplayed one song on each record on piano, but with this one, I wasdetermined to track the whole thing on piano, because that's how I'dbeen doing it at home, and at the core of the record, I thought itmight be kind of cool to have an element that was kind of unpolished,and have the other musicians play around that. So that became thespringboard for the sound of the record, with me banging away on thekeys.”

The spirit of spontaneity extended to the lead vocals, although thisaspect, too, was unplanned. “Before the band came in,” Sexsmithexplains, “ I would record each song with guitar and voice, and thenwe'd get everyone in the room and we'd all play along to that—that'swhen I'd be banging away on piano. I never thought we'd wind up usingthe guide vocals, but when I went to New York to re-sing the wholerecord, even though I was singing everything technically better, theguide vocals had more personality. I still worried about it, but I lovehearing Dylan records like that, where you can tell he's not gettingtoo fussy about his singing, and I didn't want to get too preciousabout it.”

The album was near completion at Terefe's Kensaltown Studios inLondon when, out of the blue, the producer suggested a trip to Cuba toadd a horn section. Though the players had been used by Terefe on aproject with the Alex Cuba Band—Sexsmith even sang a duet with thebandleader on one track—the artist was initially nonplussed by theidea. But he'd had spent enough time in the studio with Terefe duringthe course of their three albums together to trust the producer'sinstincts, and so, with some trepidation, he went along with the idea.He wrote a song on the flight to Havana—which became the climactic“Brighter Still,” cut on the spot with a roomful of Cuban musicians.

“There's certainly nothing Cuban about my music,” says Sexsmith witha laugh. “When I heard the horn players running through the first song,I was thinking it was over the top. But when I heard the tracks back inNew York, I was really excited; it was a whole other flavor,one that I've never had on a record before. So it didn't make sense tome at first, but now it really makes sense to me when I hear it.” Onceagain, Terefe's instincts were spot-on—because in going to Cuba, they'dsomehow located Memphis circa 1968…and just maybe a half acre of heavenas well.

Here as always, Sexsmith's priority is the song itself. “I want thelyric and the melody to be as flawless as possible,” he says, “so I'malways pretty critical of my own stuff. In general, I try to writesongs that will stand up by themselves if I'm not there. My heroes arepeople who could write all different kinds of songs. Lennon could writesomething really powerful, and be really funny in the next song; Dylanthe same way. I feel all sorts of things, and I want the songs to havedifferent character traits.”

As he was writing the songs that would comprise Exit Strategy,Sexsmith realized that what he was feeling was somewhat headier thanthe psychological terrain he'd previously inhabited. “It was excitingin a way,” he recalls, “because I was getting these lyrical ideas thatwere a bit different for me; they were reaching for something. Iwouldn't call it poetry or anything, but I was trying for somethingthat was a little more poetic. And I think that was partly inspired bywhat's going on in the world. There's something about writing on thepiano, too—it has more of a gospel-y attitude, and it puts me in adifferent place.”

As for his place in the musical universe, Sexsmith says, “Over theyears, I've built it up to the point where I have a cult following, forlack of a better term. I don't have a huge following, but for the mostpart they're very into it. So that's encouraging, and that's really allyou can ask for these days. When I got signed, I was already 30, so Inever really expected to be filling arenas. I felt that what I wasdoing didn't really fit in with what I was hearing on the radio. That'swhy it always confuses me when I hear people saying, ‘Why isn't Ronmore famous?' It's not that I think a breakthrough album is out of thequestion, but it's such a mysterious thing. I mean, I just write thesongs, and feel really lucky that I have a career.

“Recently I was in this bookstore,” he continues, “and I saw thisgiant encyclopedia of modern music. So I thought, ‘Hmm… I wonder…' Iopen it up and, sure enough, there I am, right beside the Sex Pistols.So I suppose I have made a mark in my own way. What I can honestly sayis that I'm proud of every single song that's ever been on one of myrecords. I'm not always proud of the production or the singing, butthere's not a song that I couldn't play you now and not feel good aboutit.”