Noah and the Whale

While you might recognize "Five Years Time" from a certain car commercial, the chirpy song is an anomaly in Noah and the Whale's catalog, as frontman Charlie Fink has the sort of droll, monotone voice that inspires melancholy, not breezy, good times. Even with a barrage of light-hearted mariachi horns and agile handclaps, "Shape of My Heart" wallows in self-deprecation and deadpan lyrics. And despite the airy, shuffling beat and jangly guitar in "Rocks and Daggers," the song is weighted down by lyrics about death and drowning. But it's these juxtapositions that give this album its delightful complexity.