As Generationals, New Orleans' Ted Joyner and Grant Widmer have been fine-tuning their breezy brand of guitar pop for almost half a decade. Arriving with their immediately likable, horn-augmented 1960s swinger "When They Fight, They Fight" back in 2009, the duo came across as band with a simple, crowd-pleasing intention to make indie rock as hooky and appealing as possible. Their third full-length, Heza, takes their knack for writing bright, melodically-charged pop songs, but tones down the boisterousness of its predecessor, their 2011 high-water mark, Actor-Caster.

That album grabbed you with its unabashed cheeriness; when that became too obnoxious, the more emotionally complex lyrical themes acted as something of a humanizing balm. Heza goes for understatement from the off, with single "Spinoza", a tightly-wound bit of guitar rock that succeeds because of its reluctance to overdo anything.