Young Fathers albums have raps on them but they’re not “rap albums.” Calling the Scottish trio “rappers” is equally imprecise. Their use of rap, just like their use of rhythm in general, only broadens the depth of their textural palette, which includes club, dub, industrial, R&B, and pop music. They have been given all manner of hybrid genre tags as a result ever since their Mercury Prize win for the 2014 album Dead. Now that “weird” is their normal, they’re breaking from convention again by making something more standard but no more ordinary. Their new album, the sleek Cocoa Sugar, is not necessarily less genre-curious but it is more streamlined and far easier to process.

Much of their music considers classification—whiteness and blackness, otherness and outsiderness—and is rooted in their diasporic origin story. Alloysious Massaquoi was born in Liberia then moved to Edinburgh as a child. Kayus Bankole was born in Edinburgh to Nigerian parents but lived in both the U.S. and Nigeria before moving back to Scotland in his teens). Graham “G” Hastings, the only white member, was born and raised in Edinburgh. They met at a hip-hop night as teenagers, finding each other as kindred spirits pushing back against traditional rap expectations. As the title suggests, Cocoa Sugar subtly explores the duality of light and dark, bitter and sweet, a contrast Massaquoi says is an amalgamation of the way they see the world. In these songs, they embrace their polarities without forcing them.

With 2015’s White Men Are Black Men Too, Young Fathers were clearly trying to say something, but it was unclear what, exactly. Lost in their musical obfuscation was meaning or purpose. “I’m tired of blaming the white man/His indiscretions don’t betray him/A black man can play him/Some white men are black men too,” Massaquoi rapped on “Old Rock n Roll.” There wasn’t much to the idea other than funneling this pent-up anxiety and exasperation. Cocoa Sugar is less preoccupied with veiled statements and more interested in concepts and impressions, moving more on impulse. “Turn” even offers a bit of a correction to “Old Rock n Roll.” “Don’t you turn my brown eyes blue,” it demands. “I’m nothing like you.”

The songs on Cocoa Sugar are unquestionably Young Fathers’ most accessible. They have a sense of a narrative flow and an overarching theme, but they’re still knotty and confounding. Much of the writing is symbolic, at times biblical and political, but more about feeling than anything. It’s full of bravado, cynicism, and wonder in equal measure. There are broader allusions to the current social and civic moments, but they are intentionally left obscure. What separates this album from previous ones is their willingness to present powerful images without imposing their will. “Not here to drown ya; I’m only here to cleanse ya,” Bankole raps. It is at once rousing, illusive, and inviting.

“G” Hastings, the group’s primary producer, is tasked with curating the whole Young Fathers experience, and on Cocoa Sugar he stages some striking and imaginative scenes. The muffled, half-sung vocals on “Turn” bleed into coiling 8-bit synth progressions that tuck in and out of one another. “Fee Fi” is a maelstrom, all fidgety drums, minor-key piano plunks, and vocals of varying frequencies. “Lord,” which is almost a gospel song with its choir and piano accompaniment, suddenly surges into a guitar riff that beams like light through a stained glass window.

There are some obvious religious overtones throughout Cocoa Sugar, which is as fascinated with holiness and heresy as idol worship, and these moments color the album’s tone and worldview. On “Picking You,” a loss of faith becomes a non sequitur for establishing virtue: “I said the only time I go to church is when someone’s in the casket/Good men are strange, bad men are obvious.” The wordy incantation “Holy Ghost” is even more cynical: “You can tell your deity I’m alright/Wake up from the dead, call me Jesus Christ.” Delilah is used as a signifier for sin on “In My View,” and on “See How” they embrace a cruel reality about morality: “I’ve never seen wicked ones face their fears/I’ve always seen brave men filled with tears/The older you get, the colder you get.” Massaquoi has said that they see the world as “aesthetically pleasing, but fucked up,” beautiful but broken and godless. On Cocoa Sugar, it shows, in their gorgeous meditations on chaos.