Unclouded is a short and sweet 30-minute indie pop album that’s elevated far beyond its simple foundations by exquisite orchestration and an unusually active rhythmic bed, with every element chosen for its warmth and gentle joy. The chamber strings carry an elegant and cinematic quality, and the music evokes a carefully tended garden in full bloom, glowing with colour.

One of the defining features of the album is its groovy and nimble drumming with beats that are often surprisingly busy, full of fast tumbling rolls and breakbeat patterns that bring a lift to the album’s otherwise soft and languid textures. The drums never dominate, but they provide an essential sense of propulsion that keeps the record buoyant and alive even at its calmest moments as the guitars remain delicate and understated.

Melody’s high-pitched vocal delivery has a breathy and childlike innocence that feels angelic, layered with harmonies in a luminous halo. With a sense of softness and safety, strings play a central role throughout Unclouded, with The House That Doesn’t Exist setting the tone with beautiful, filmic violins. Eyes Closed stands out as one of the record’s more overtly psychedelic moments, leaning into trippier textures that recall The Beatles-indebted side of The Chemical Brothers on Let Forever Be. There’s an echo of 60s psych pop in the way melodies bloom and dissolve, particularly on Into Shadows where the happy chorus sings of a sunburst breaking through the shadows.

Small instrumental details add texture and charm throughout the album, such as the soft xylophone runs of Burning Man, and the bass lines move with an easy, melodic confidence rewarding attentive listening and deepening the sense that this is a carefully crafted world. There’s something unmistakably French in the album’s poise and grace, carrying a sense of elegance, lightness, and cheeky warmth that feels culturally specific. The overall effect is one of thankfulness and contentment, a record that feels like being wrapped in a cozy blanket.

Everything about Unclouded feels fantastical and fairy-like, stepping away from reality and imagining a gentler, brighter one, as if Melody has built a little Wonderland where nothing ugly or intrusive is allowed in. In half an hour it arrives, envelops you, and disappears with no melancholy or darkness to unpack, just carefully balanced beauty. It’s joyful, lush, and untroubled, not asking to be analysed but enjoyed.

Unclouded is a treat in the purest sense, asking nothing difficult of you and giving back an enormous amount in return, like a glass of orange juice for the spirit. Everything here is exquisitely played and arranged, but none of it is complicated, instead choosing to remain effortlessly immediate and easy to love.