Shangri La

The third studio album from Malibu genre-scramblers West Indian Girl took nearly six years to make. And though the band went through a lineup change, some of 2013’s Shangri La plays like a more ripened version of its 2004 eponymous debut. The opening “Under the Light” sprinkles fluttering electro tones over throbbing dance beats and washy dream-pop guitars. But it’s the soaring vocals sung in alluring threesome harmonies by Robert James, Eva Zeva, and Laura Vall that create the album’s first fetching melody. The following “Taboo” is an even more beguiling song that ingeniously grafts South Asian melodies to a thick dub rootstalk. Even when “Season’s Change” backpedals to '70s Supertramp-styled piano pop, the ascending three-part harmonies crackle with an emotional energy that’s more informed by 21st-century bands like Destroyer and Tame Impala. The standout song “Funk Your Money” takes its cues from The Band’s Garth Hudson with what sounds like a clavinet pumped through a wah-wah pedal, akin to that backwoods boogie heard in “Cripple Creek.” The rest of the song writhes and wiggles with regal disco aplomb.