As a fella, I suppose I should be somewhat ashamed to admit I love shoes. Not that I’ve gone all Imelda Marcos and have a roomful of shoes to wade through every morning, but I am a sucker for a good pair a colorful soccer shoes or sporty sneedles. What do shoes have to do with Math & Physics Club? Well, it is the first you notice if you pick up their new EP, Baby I’m Yours, two pairs of excellent shoes on legs covered with stylish jeans crossing some city street. Luckily, the shoes aren’t the only thing impressive about the EP. Math & Physics Club continue to produce some of the finest melancholy modern rock on this (or any) continent.

Baby I’m Yours features four new songs for your listening pleasure, and Math & Physics Club pull no punches, so if you loved their self-titled debut, you’re bound to get all fuzzy about the new EP. That being said, Math & Physics Club do try a few new things; namely, they introduce a little more variety in the rhythm section. The title track lacks the almost signature MAPC brushed drums, which are traded in for real drumsticks to drive the gentle, post-Smiths melody, and the song is pop rock at its finest. The bigger change might be the electro-pop turn taken by the band on “Do You Keep a Diary.” The song takes the Belle & Sebastian comparison in a new direction, almost sounding like a hybrid between the aforementioned band and the Pet Shop Boys. It works remarkably well for a band built on a foundation of simple arrangements, coming across like a song from a future Math & Physics Club that fell backwards through time to us. Meanwhile, “In This Together” and “Nothing Really Happened” fill in between and bring us the Math & Physics club we know and love. “Nothing Really Happened” is especially gorgeous reworking of what is supposedly one of the first songs written by the band. The mixture of the Marr/Morrissey melody and the gentle violin are like a warm fall evening by the sound.

So, if you’re in need of something to keep your attention as you wait for a new Math & Physics Club album, Baby I’m Yours is excellent gift from the band just in time for the holidays. It shows the band is the master of its domain, crafting soft and beautiful pop songs with the best of them.