Singer, songwriter, and keyboardist/bass player first unleashed her inventive indie rock on a broader audience with her 2013 debut, . Three years later, she delivers a similarly ambitious and spunky bricolage of rock, funk, jazz, hip-hop, Caribbean rhythms, and electronics with . It was produced by longtime collaborator and drummer , whom met while studying voice at the Berklee College of Music. The album opens with a brief prelude that prepares listeners for crisp production, infectious grooves, and a mix of organic and mechanical sounds including loops. The songwriter's elegant and agile, jazzy vocal quality is revealed over time, beginning with the relaxed R&B patter and modest scatting of "Don't Wanna Be," and perhaps cresting with her -inspired delivery on "Lonely Lover," though other tunes are in the running. Lyrically, doesn't shy away from politics and social commentary on her sophomore LP. The rapid-fire straight talk of "Mexican Chef" chronicles race and class in America's urban service industry, summarizing with "It's a party 'cross America, bachata in the back." Alongside clarinet and beats, "How Strange It Is" questions humankind's self-imposed boundaries and battles, from nations to the rat race. The fractured "See Them" switches keys, rhythms, instrumentation, and vocal style without warning for an experimental but still engaging quasi-improvisation that asks, "Where you gonna put the brown girl now, she's tearin' it up"). The fierce "Just Like I" confronts with rolling polyrhythms, electric-guitar riffs, and lyrics like "Just like I love, I kill, I kill you" and "With the same teeth, I smile, I bite you." Consistently challenging and infectious at once, is the kind of album that comes along only once in a while, where bold goes down smooth. ~ Marcy Donelson