On his 2016 debut album Basement Behavior, Seance Crasher’s Kevin Rafn dialed in the sound he’d been exploring over the previous few years. With the help of producer Riley Geare (Unknown Mortal Orchestra), Rafn fortified the lo-fi bedroom aesthetic of his early EPs and steadied his tentative (but undeniably tuneful) synth-pop with tighter arrangements and some reliable blues and rock moves. The result was a strong, confident record—like watching an awkward teenager grow into a self-assured young adult.

With that framework set, Rafn sounds ready to start exploring again on Seance Crasher’s sophomore album, Gentle Cycle. Out of the picture (or at least the album credits) is Geare, with Rafn taking his place in the producer’s chair. Throwback vibes still fill the air, but across these eight tracks, Seance Crasher turns toward a particularly psychedelic brand of synth-fueled funk.

Opening track “Haymaker” wastes no time establishing this new sound, with Rafn cooing about kissing while a bass line burbles low in the mix and wah-wah guitars swell and pop like soap bubbles. Later, “Candy Lips” takes this model and pumps it up with disco swagger, while “Feel It,” with its vibrant synths and snappy pace, sounds like it was imported from the soundtrack of some long-lost futuristic ’80s film. It’s the perfect lead-in to album highlight “Shotgun,” where all of Rafn’s inclinations—zips and zaps, boogie-down rhythms, convincing retro-strut, memorable melodies—come together to create a distinctive mini-world.

Elsewhere, Seance Crasher returns to some of its tried and true influences—namely ’70s songwriter pop, à la Todd Rundgren—on songs like the spacious and soaring “Homeless Pierce Brosnan,” and they sound more at ease tucked into those grooves than they do on most of the synth-funk tracks. Which is totally fine, because overall, Gentle Cycle is not just an album, but a document of a band’s growth spurt.