Beneath the Skin.

Of Monsters & Men’s debut album, My Head is an Animal (amazon • iTunes), remains one of my favorite albums of the decade, a gorgeous blend of upbeat folk-rock tracks that crossed over to pop radio and somber songs that eschwed the poppier melodies of “Little Talks” and “Mountain Sound” for a greater emotional payoff and more nuanced instrumentation. I happened to love it all, although the hits were what allowed me to share my love of this album with my daughter, who was just short of six when it came out.

Their follow-up album, Beneath the Skin (amazon • iTunes) , came out earlier this month, a substantially more mature record that almost completely foregoes the pop inclinations in favor of slower, soaring pieces that better showcase lead singer Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir’s sweet, slightly raspy delivery while increasing the complexity of their arrangements. It seems like an album less likely to go platinum, as their debut did, but more likely to garner critical acclaim and, I’d assume, a more satisfying experience for the band to write and create.

My Head is an Animal earned favorable comparisons to the contemporaneous debut album from Mumford & Sons, as both artists folded traditional folk-music sounds into rock or pop/rock song structures, and both artists were somewhat criticized for repeating those structures throughout their albums. Mumford & Sons has gone backwards since that debut, whereas Of Monsters & Men, an Icelandic sextet led by a bearded elf and a smoky-voiced gamine, took over three years between studio recordings, and have chosen to pursue a more sophisticated, less overtly commercial direction with their follow-up.

While OM&M’s sound is unmistakable, in no small part due to Nanna’s voice, the musical predictability of their debut is absent on Beneath the Skin, along with all of the sing-along choruses from their first album. In place of those big harmonies are more ornate percussion lines and even the occasional empty spaces between notes. “Slow Life” has smaller harmonies in its chorus, but the verses have Nanna and the unusual drum line at the front of the sound, creating melody through layered instruments rather than blatant pop hooks. The lead single and opening track, “Crystals,” is the closest song on the album to a pop song, but it’s still more ornate than most of the songs on their debut album, driven by a heavy world-music percussion line, supplemented by brass when both singers join together on the bridge to the big chorus – the most prominent pop hook on the entire album.

OM&M’s lyrics have also taken a modest step forward on Beneath the Skin, with more concrete imagery and less of the vague faux-folktale motifs that characterized their debut album – think “Mountain Sound,” for example, which sounds like it’s telling you a really interesting story until you realize they’ve given you no details whatsoever on what’s happening. Beneath the Skin relies more on recurring themes and images (spines, blood, teeth, bodies of water), still light on storytelling, with frequent allusions to people acting on animal instincts or blurring the lines between the human and the lupine. Tracks like “Organs” even veer into more disturbing territory, transmuting regret or sorrow into images of self-harm. There are still some lyrical lightweights on the album – “I Of the Storm” puts Nanna’s voice front and center, but gives her vapid lyrics unworthy of her singing – but it’s an incremental step forward from their first output.

Ultimately Beneath the Skin feels like an album Of Monsters & Men made for themselves, as if this were the kind of record they’d wanted to make until the A&R man complained that he didn’t hear a single. It seems more personal, although it’s more that the musical style and increased prominence of Nanna’s vocals result in a sound that’s more introspective. Exchanging the exuberance of the band’s debut for a more subtle, lush sound creates a more unified, mature album, despite the lack of a hit to deliver to pop stations, a welcome if incremental step forward from the best artist to come out of Iceland since the Sugarcubes.

Since we’re around the year’s midpoint, here are my top five albums for the year to date (links go to reviews):
1. Courtney Barnett – Sometimes I Sit and Think and Sometimes I Just Sit
2. The Wombats – Glitterbug
3. Sleater-Kinney – No Cities to Love
4. Of Monsters & Men – Beneath the Skin
5. Drenge – Undertow.

I’ve still got a few recent albums I have yet to hear in their entirety (Wolf Alice, Bully) so this list will probably shift well before the year is out.