The Life Pursuit

Written almost entirely by frontman Stuart Murdoch, the new Belle and Sebastian album, their sixth, makes a return to Matador Records and is a magnificently assured and diverse pop record. With nods to influences as diverse Cornelius, Manfred Mann, David Bowie, The Life Pursuit mingles the folky, be-sweatered pathos of their earliest work with joyfully satirical laste-'60s sunshine pop and the sophisticated early '80s-influenced work reminiscent of their prior album, 2003's Dear Catastrophe Waitress.