INDIGO DE SOUZA Precipice (Loma Vista) — Following her strong third album, All of This Will End, Indigo De Souza took a diversion into more experimental electronic music with the EP Wholesome Evil Fantasy. On her new full-length studio effort, the pendulum swings back. More than ever before, De Souza embraces clear, chiming pop sounds. If crossover hits were still a viable thing — at least until some quirk of TikTok fate elevates an obscurity several years after its release — there would be cause to think that De Souza is about to storm the charts. On Precipice, De Souza works with Los Angeles–based producer Elliot Kozel, and he helps to make the songs notably bright and vivid. That doesn’t mean they’re not also preoccupied with the sadness as disappointments that arrive like spam texts in young adulthood. “Crying Over Nothing” is a prime example of how De Souza and her cohorts can make a sad song sound exuberant. De Souza’s rich, inventive vocals imbue the material with striking intensity. The driving track “Heartthrob,” for instance, finds De Souza wielding the lyric “I really put my back into it” like a valkyrie’s weapon. Occasionally, De Souza’s embrace of modern pop stylings is so thorough that a song — such as synth-pop gem “Crush” — feels like it could have come from just about any current artist with reasonable command of a mixing board. More often, De Souza is doing what she’s always done: making music is distinctly, solely hers. Dance on the edge with the following cuts: “Be Like the Water,” “Heartbreaker,” and “Pass It By.”

NIGHT MOVES Double Life (Domino) — It’s been six years between full-length albums for the Minneapolis band Night Moves. Their long-gestating fourth LP, Double Life, definitely sounds like the work of an artist who’s not in a particular rush. Frontman and chief songwriter John Pelant comes across as a person who’s been ruminating a lot on life’s up and downs (with downs seeming to tally more marks on the scoreboard) and has opted to solemnly share what he’s learned. The laid-back, countrified rock of the early nineteen-seventies has long been a touchstone for Night Moves, and the new album continues in that tone, though without sounding stuck in the past. “Trying to Steal a Smile” is lithe, smooth throwback, like Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show by way of Fleet Foxes, and “State Sponsored Psychosis” gets nicely soulful. Jarvis Taveniere co-produced the album, and he brings some of the same warm breezes that have defined his work on multiple albums with Woods. At the same time, Night Moves square their shoulders and assert that they’re not going to make the sort of airy folk-rock that can feel like it dissipates into mist as it leaves the speakers; “Almost Perfect” convincingly reclaims the gentle rock epic from the War of Drugs. Double Life is nicely weighted with the extra time that went into it. Make some front page drive-in news with these tracks: “Hold On to Tonight,” “Ring My Bell,” and “This Time Tomorrow.”