As the 2020 lockdown commenced in Britain, Tim Burgess found an effective way to entertain a nation in isolation. Every night, Twitter gathered at #TimsTwitterListeningParty to play appointed albums while the artists and collaborators shared anecdotes from making those records. Apart from generating calls for the Charlatans frontman to be knighted for services to keeping spirits up, the virtual gatherings spotlighted his bottomless enthusiasm and curiosity for music. Also emerging during the COVID-19 outbreak, his fifth solo album is another vivid reflection of that personality: exuberant, adventurous pop that, even in its darkest corners, is warm-souled and melodic. Largely written by Burgess in pre-lockdown solitude in Norfolk, the album freewheels through chamber pop, drone rock, piano balladry, and psych, finding lyrical inspiration everywhere from America’s West Coast (“Lucky Creatures”) to an escalator in a London drugstore (“The Mall”). On the self-searching “Timothy,” it’s that faith in words and melody that shines through again: “When the music starts it fills my heart/Oh, those songs/Make us strong.” I Love the New Sky is just one more exhibit in the case for Burgess being crowned a national treasure.