Whether because or in spite of their oddball ode, the band gained wide recognition (well, from indie webzines, anyway). So, even though Bitte Orca is the group's sixth album in as many years, it will be scrutinized like the sophomore album after a critically lauded debut. In other words, it's supposed to suck. Instead, Dirty Projectors have successfully honed their craft without compromising their vision. Bitte Orca possesses all the wacky charms of any previous entry in the group's discography, but these charms are more neatly arranged. The joys are perhaps slightly less spontaneous, but their more considered placement makes the band's verbal whoops and guitar pop crescendos more poignant, more memorable.

The centerpiece of the album is "Useful Chamber," the de facto title track with its refrain of "Bitte orca, orca bitte" and the theme-revealing couplet, "I'm caught up in a storm / That I don't need no shelter from." This is a good metaphor for the intensity of new love, as well as a perfect encapsulation of the experience of listening to this song (and to the whole album, for that matter). Even when calm seas of long vocal notes and a slow beat suddenly give way to squalls of feedback that toss you through jagged guitar lines and whipping drums, you can enjoy the wild ride, because you know that Dirty Projectors will guide you safely back to shore.

More than that, the band are slobbering all over you with musical love. You can hear it in the ecstatic volleys of "ooh-ay-oh" between Angel Deradoorian and Amber Coffman, which ping and pong around Dave Longstreth's vocals on "Cannibal Resource," a song about … well, you know how inscrutable cannibals can be! Beneath the track's loopy joy, however, there is a sinister reference to being "more than a terrified witness / Behind the arbitrary line." In "Remade Horizon," too, it's easy to get entranced by the gorgeous and spirited round of harmonies, as the band sings, "Yeah, I want a / Yeah, I want a remade horizon." Dirty Projectors make it sound like fun, but this need for a do-over spreads through every facet of the singer's life: the backyard, the living room, the market, in parking lots, at weddings, and even in the margins of the freeway. The dude is haunted, obsessed.

This layering is why it's such a pleasure to fall deeper and deeper into Bitte Orca. The band – so earnest and gleeful and loopy and tuneful – make repeat listens a joy, while Longstreth's labyrinth of anxieties and observations allow you to reap further rewards with each spin of Dirty Projectors' excellent new album.

Recommended Tracks: "Cannibal Resource," "Remade Horizon," "Useful Chamber"

-Michael Keefe