Retreating from the anxious post-punk of their counterintuitively titled Sunny Hills LP, Liverpool trio All We Are strike a more positive tone on Providence, their sunny and sultry third album. A somewhat peculiar band whose non-English lineup -- guitarist Luis Santos is Brazilian, bassist Guro Gikling is Norwegian, and drummer Richard O'Flynn is Irish -- and sparkling semi-tropical feel helped their 2015 debut stand out, they made a considerably darker turn on their 2017 follow-up, channeling their unrest into a tense, wiry sound that hinted at Krautrock more than indie pop. After taking a break to pursue individual projects, the three friends regrouped in a former school of which O'Flynn is the property manager and, with producer Dave McCracken, set about capturing a set of brightly lit, mostly danceable songs concerning themes of love, sex, and friendship. Set to propulsive grooves and glittering guitar and synth riffs, All We Are offer up songs of seduction and romance replete with blasts of bright sonic color to counter the world's ills. Harking back to the R&B-infused dream pop of their first album, Providence is a similarly lush affair sung between Gikling and Santos in soulful falsetto while O'Flynn capably drives the train forward. All three are strong players and their amorous outlook in a time of strife is commendable, but unfortunately there is little here that really asserts itself, or when it does it self-sabotages with clunky lyrics like "you know I want your body and you think I'm sexy, like a piña colada, you're not gonna waste me" from the otherwise funky "Not Your Man." The entire set feels a little too stuck in its fixed gear of misty midtempo soft pop and sex funk, without the songs to really distinguish itself nor the dramatic peaks and valleys to make it feel like more of a journey. It's not an altogether bad record and it ends on a bright note with two of its best cuts -- "Bad Advice" and "Deliver It" -- but for all of its amiable intentions, it comes across as short on personality.