Adam Lambert Calls New Album 'Existential Pop'

Adam Lambert has made no bones about the fact that the follow-up to his post-"American Idol" bow, For Your Entertainment, would be his kind of album, telling MTV News earlier this year: "It's really exciting, because I think I'm making my dream album. I know that sounds a bit clichéd, but I'm making exactly what I want to listen to."

In the cover story of November's The Advocate, he explains just what he's been working on all these months, and it sounds like he's truly making his bid for "Idol" independence, describing his new songs as "Nine Inch Nails meets George Michael."

"I know that's a weird mash-up, but that's what it feels like," Lambert said. "No matter what the genre is, it's all very personal, even on upbeat, fun tracks. The last album was a little bit more of a fantasy escape ... even my image for that last album felt very theatrical and kind of over-the-top and intentionally tacky. I get a kick out of making artistic statements that are kind of ridiculous."

And in the process of making those songs, he's also pulling the curtain back on his personal life, letting his fans get a peek at the real Lambert behind all the leather.

"I think it's going to let people underneath my facade a little bit — a self-created and totally admitted facade," he said. "I'm trying to convey to my audience that you really can't judge a book by its cover, and there's more to the universe than you can see with your eyes. It's like existential pop."

Of course, there still remains the question of when folks will get to hear any of that existential pop. At the moment, there's still no release date for Lambert's new album (an email to his label, RCA, was not responded to by press time) — though, in recent weeks, he took to Twitter to explain that the delay has been due mainly to "a couple of creative setbacks" on his first single, and that, as of the right now, his album is due "in the spring." But as he explained to The Advocate, Lambert isn't letting those label issues bother him. At the moment, he's just focused on perfecting his new songs.

"It takes time to get it right," he said. "I don't know how other artists do it, but for this project, I'm adopting the mentality of just keep writing and keep recording as much as possible, and then when we know that we're ready to decide which tracks are going to be on the album, we'll look at everything and narrow it down."