Granted, in that time the band have been busy with other things, not least Zane Lowe, known much more for his media exploits as a Radio 1 DJ than his work the other side of the studio doors. You might assume that given his drive and enthusiasm for presenting that Lowe would be part of a hyperactively charged musical approach, but here he's happy to join band mate Hamish Clark and more recent recruit, singer Andy Lovegrove, in making some blissed-out music.

While Roofers dealt primarily with electronica The Sound Inside goes for a more earthy, acoustic sound, with emotionally concentrated vocals to boot. It's easy-going for sure, but that doesn't render it lightweight. Indeed the shafts of light the contentedly upbeat vocals bring seem occasionally to be masking something a little darker, a feeling hinted at in the lyrics of Settle Down, which murmurs "seems the more you suffer too, the more I settle down", over a warm fretless bass sound.

Elsewhere Lowe's carefree, 'love life' attitude shines through and is shared by the band. The Otherside searches with Lovegrove's falsetto verse and finds an anthemic, gospel-tinged chorus. Last Night taps into a Massive Attack vibe, a torch song whose verse melody strongly resembles REM's Everybody Hurts. Meanwhile the tender A Place For You invites the subject to "just come down next to me".

Just as the record seems about to go on too long it reigns in with a couple of twilight moments, the penultimate track even bringing a sense of impending occasion with its "the time has come" lyrics. Not a heavyweight close, but once again a bit of depth brought to what might in other hands be a throwaway collection of tracks.

So a song-based indulgence, then, that draws lightly on soul, blues and lo-fi folk, not to mention the hip hop Lowe and Clark know and love. Recruiting Lovegrove seems to have been something of a masterstroke for them though, and with him in the mix the trio's vocal collages bring something of the desert heat suggested by the cover, and make for a highly evocative record.

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Mercury Prize 2009 nominees