Now It’s Overhead

On its third release for Omaha’s Saddle Creek record label, Athens, Georgia’s Now It’s Overhead continues to produce dark pop music that is simultaneously haunting and hummable. Opener “Let the Sirens Rest” combines a hip-swaying backbeat with a Southern Gothic attitude that would make Flannery O’Connor proud, and the strangely groovy drive of “Walls” and the four-on-the-snare cadence of “Type A” keep the proceedings from getting too gloomy. Frontman Andy LeMaster’s way with both dramatic and melodic tension recalls fellow Athenians Michael Stipe (heard on Fall Back Open) and Peter Buck, and new-wave phantoms and shoe-gazing sprites lurk in every shadow. Though Dark Light Daybreak occasionally treads too much of the same ground already charted by the outfit’s first two albums, LeMaster’s deft songwriting and production give the record the hopeful sparkle of dawn suggested by its title.