[1] The band's twelfth studio release follows a four-year period where front man Mark Oliver "E" Everett took a hiatus from music.

The Deconstruction is the first Eels studio album in four years; Everett was burned out after touring and recording with the band's previous releases and considered retiring from music.

[2] In the interim, he made a few public performances, acted in the Netflix original series Love,[3] and went through a marriage, the birth of his first son, and divorce.

"[14] In Exclaim!, Ian Gormley gave the album a six out of 10, criticizing the lyrics and summarizing his review, "For now, The Deconstruction is a rather rote and lacklustre return".

"[18] Pitchfork's Ian Cohen wrote that, "Everett trots out his reflexive self-loathing and elementary rhyme schemes one more time, with no clear reason why" and peppers most of his review with sentences taken directly from previous Pitchfork reviews of Eels albums such as "it leaves little to the imagination for anyone who’s followed Eels to this point" and summarizing "The Deconstruction produces no eccentricity, pop smarts, orchestral creativity, or emotional revelation".