he enchanting art-pop of Aloha is an excellent example of pretension’s benefits. The tumbling walls of vibraphone, shape-shifting song structures and the plaintive, poetic woe of vocalist Tony Cavallario would be unwelcome among any adherent to a less-is-more philosophy. Play Here Comes Everyone for your primitivist friends and be prepared to duck. But among all the ambitious maneuvers is a substantive core of melancholy the Cleveland band manages to express in guiltlessly complex tearjerkers that beg the term “progressive”, and redeem it as well.

Using the fractured rhythmic drive of post-rock heroes like Tortoise and the unpredictable tonal shifts of bands that at one time might’ve sung about mythical Squonks dancing upon Topographic Oceans, Aloha instead direct their energies toward deeper emotional rewards. The bittersweet mood that infuses each of their releases rarely lapses; instead the eagerness to stretch the form and content of their music gives them opportunity to amplify that subtle sorrow, to take it around unsuspected corners, always coaxing the listener along with an assured sense of melody.

Aloha has lost one of their signature weapons though. From 1999s The Great Communicators to 2002s Sugar they benefited from the vibraphone playing of Eric Koltnow who created tense clouds of resonance by playing in a jazzy, chromatic style that made ample use of the “out” notes between the comfortably in-tune ones. It was an unsettling effect at first, but one that added welcome counterpoint to the moony dolor. Newbie T.J. Lipple brings his own set of slightly more conventional vibraphones however, along with some marimba and the most active mellotron since The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway dropped. Although Koltnow’s more challenging approach is missed, Aloha’s vivid grandeur is unscathed.

Where to begin? For one thing, there’s an impressive variety between the charging “Summer Away”, the pulsing “Boys in the Bathtub” and the syrupy “Setting up Shop”, gorgeous like a late period Brian Wilson ballad, with harpsichords dribbling over Cavallario’s limpid, wandering vocal. Here the group shows growth by using simple, direct ideas like a basic drum and piano pattern, confident enough to back off the instrumental cleverness when necessary. Aloha’s style is becoming more elastic with time, too; more sounds are creeping in yet the effect is amazingly consistent. It’s why this record is so enjoyable from beginning to end—and why queuing up one tune usually leads to listening to the whole thing.

This music is continuously surprising and rich. Songs like “Water Your Hands”, where a Phillip Glass like circular piano pattern opens that snowballs into a luminous lament, or the loose, dynamic riffage of “Goodbye to the Factory” make it clear: Aloha is the real deal. If the undercurrents of sentimentality are too much for you, it’s your loss.

So please calibrate this rave according to your own tolerance for artsy-fartsy pop, but don’t go overboard. Here Comes Everyone is another small step forward from a band that was borderline brilliant to begin with.