The first two albums from Kiwi Jr. were like excitable puppies, leaping all over the place. On the Toronto band's latest, though, they've chilled out a bit. First single "Night Vision" was a total surprise: darker but no less vibrant, it's spacey, synth-driven and chillier than their usual high-noon heat. Singer Jeremy Gaudet has said that after writing this song—with lyrics like "It might take another year/ It might take a shotgunned beer/ It might take a rifled deer"—they shaped the rest of the album around it: "A lot of the images in the lyrics are of teenagers driving around … putting their parents' car in the ditch, etc. But the idea at the center of the song is that of working up the nerve to make a big decision. Like a boxer getting pumped up before a fight." "The Extra Sees the Film" also fits that template of cool distance, both in melody and Gaudet's vividly skewering imagery. "There's a soft opening, she'll be there if you wanna stop by/ Flirting with the human scorpion jacket from Drive/ He's a haircut aiming a jar of gin/ And he talks about Los Angeles, that's a cue for you to jump in." And while the band, and Gaudet in particular, are still drawing inspiration from Pavement—"Clerical Sleep" liberally borrows the "ba-ba-ba-da-ba" of Pavement's "Debris Slide" and runs it through a '60s filter—the singer somehow sounds a little less like Stephen Malkmus this time; not as nasal, and switching up his phrasings. A couple of other new things really jump out. There's a love of carnival music, which is fully embraced on the Petula Clark-ish "Unspeakable Things" and joyous-furious pop-punk "Downtown Area Blues," and given a twisted makeover on "Contract Killers." That track also delivers a delightful turn of phrase: "By the time wicker had been wove … all the liquor was gone and we drove home." (You can imagine it used in a mob movie: "The wicker's been woven." The fix is in!) "Parasite II" uses bouncy, swirly synth to support lyrics of great denial ("There's gotta be another man in the house who's spending all the money/ Someone down in the laundry room keeps shrinking all my shirts"). And both doom-chasing "Kennedy Curse" and closer "The Masked Singer" weave in happy-sad '80s synths that swerve and swoon and nod at The Cure and Modern English. The latter, clocking in at an epic six minutes, carries one of Kiwi Jr.'s prettiest melodies as it weirdly namechecks game shows, including So You Think You Can Dance. © Shelly Ridenour/Qobuz