Luaka Bop

Brooklyn duo Javelin started off as surrealist pop-collage provocateurs, playing house parties armed with boom boxes. But they’ve entered a more refined, congenial and way more hooky headspace with Hi Beams, their second full-length album. Which isn’t to say that they aren’t still weirdos: They treat instrumental tones like splashes of paint in a Jackson Pollock painting, spraying high-voltage synths and vocoders all over “Nnormal” (a spooky art-pop “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” ), and blending spiky synth-horns and overblown arena-rock guitar crunch on the delirious instrumental “Judgement Nite.” But this is top-shelf sonic symmetry and Javelin never sacrifices catchiness or humor in favor of experimentation. “Airfield” would be a kitschy disco tribute if it weren’t so musically rich, and the giddy electro-pop anthem “Light Out” tugs at the heartstrings with its tongue firmly in cheek.