Even when he’s masking his voice in swampy synthesizers and opensore guitar fuzz, Noah “Panda Bear” Lennox can’t help but sound pretty. On his fifth solo LP, the Animal Collective adventurer puts his money where his mouth is—framing that ethereal choir-boy drone as the centerpiece of 13 minimalist electro-rock jams. Grim Reaper isn’t a radical departure: With its melodic buoyancy and hypnotic repetition, it feels like a more even-keeled take on the Day-Glo psych-pop of 2007’s Person Pitch. Despite its brooding title, Reaper reaches outward with lightness and sweetness, cutting back on the claustrophobic reverb of 2011’s Tomboy. The chromatic hook on “Mr Noah” springboards off distorted guitar churn; “Crosswords” is a soulful groove built on sampled breakbeats and delayed piano. Given Lennox’s round tone and layered harmonies, parsing out the words is difficult. (See: the call-and response choral arrangement on “Boys Latin.”) It’s also unnecessary. Speaking in transcendent tongues is this dude’s milieu.