If good pop music is timeless, then The Pains of Being Pure at Heart should be chart-topping contenders. Alas, they're not. Instead, Kip Berman and his revolving-door posse of collaborators are another struggling New York indie act. Filed alongside Bombay Bicycle Club and Little Green Cars, TPOBPAH are earnest, diffident, smart and occasionally twee. Tracing lines from The Go-Betweens and Prefab Sprout to The Cure and Ride, Berman's ideas are shot through the softest-focus filter, resulting in songs that are introspective yet welcoming, melancholy yet joyous. Less indebted to its influences than the band's previous two albums, Days of Abandon is packed with anthemic indie snaps (Eurydice), smooth shoegaze crackles (Until the Sun Explodes) and hooks that are pure pop (Beautiful You). What's not to love? thepainsofbeingpureatheart.com