Sometimes a band you’d long given up on surprises you. Such is the case with the album at #16, Band of Horses’s fifth album Why Are You OK. Every since “Is The a Ghost” got stuck in my head sometime in late 2007, I’ve had trouble liking this band. Their debut album, Everything All the Time, is a great album. They really nailed it with that one. Each album since then has been a shadow of that original greatness.

And I’m not saying this new one is better than their 2006 debut. This is — finally — the follow-up album I’ve been waiting for them to make all along. It was produced by Jason Lyle of Grandaddy, and maybe that has something to do with the subtle-but-important differences that show up. “Casual Party,” the first single from the album, featured above, is a classic Band of Horses song. It sounds like them, they’re having fun, and it’s catchy and rocking.

The rest of the album builds off that song, to leave you with a warm glow inside. I had the pleasure of seeing these guys perform at the Paramount earlier this year, and the live versions of these songs are every bit as good as they sound recorded. And lead singer Ben Bridwell is having a blast. He’s the type of guy that seems like he’d be friends with everybody, he’d be the one to buy you a round just for being you. And that’s the sense you get out of this album, too.

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17. Not To Disappear by Daughter
18. Sunlit Youth by Local Natives
19. I Had a Dream That You Were Mine by Hamilton Leithauser + Rostam
20. ★ by David Bowie
21. Farewell, Starlite! by Francis and the Lights
22. This Unruly Mess I’ve Made by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
23. LNZNDRF by LNZNDRF
24. Puberty 2 by Mitski
25. Light Upon the Lake by Whitney
26. A Corpse Wired for Sound by Merchandise
27. Away by Okkervil River
28. case/lang/veirs by case/lang/veirs
29. Love Letter for Fire by Sam Beam & Jesca Hoop
30. Barbara Barbara, We Face a Shining Future by Underworld
31. Preoccupations by Preoccupations