LP includes download coupon. Seattle's LA LUZ runs cool. Their brand of coolness isn't about distance or affect; it's a mood, and something about this music vibrates to the dusky, dreamy smell of dying moons and shadows.

So yeah, that kind of cool. What makes La Luz stand out is that this is a band that embodies that most elusive slant on the human condition: longing, and the fleeting relief that tags alongside deep desire.

In Spanish, LA LUZ means "light" and that's the perfect thing to evoke when your songs give the illusion of veering in the opposite direction.

But lift out most any lyric-which is a good excuse to give a closer listen to the delicate, four-part harmonies that are fast becoming the band's signature-and you'll find that the aches and pains of love and loss, of living in a world where no foothold is ever a promise-all this is delivered with a nuanced dose of perfectly timed exhilaration, like the whole thing might just be worth it in the end.

Last spring LA LUZ went to a steamy trailer park to record their debut LP "It's Alive" with their friend and engineer Johnny Goss.

From the first get-psyched drum roll and eerie chords of "Sure As Spring", the dinged-up pop gem that opens the album, the rest moves like a slow drive on a dangerous road, slinking and bending as the terrain shifts.

On "What Good Am I?", the lead vocals, and the swirl of harmonies that surround it, recall the Spartan haze of MAZZY STAR's misty-eyed super hit.

Smack in the middle is the title track. "It's Alive" is a jangly rocker with a spooky refrain, oodles of ooohs, and a marauding narrative that nails down the misty logic of the rest of the album.

Two instrumentals, "Sunstroke" and "Phantom Feelings", showcase the band's beach jam surf chops, and fall perfectly between the chilled out heartache that surrounds them.