“I spent a week in a dusty library” is how “French Navy,” the opening single from Scottish group Camera Obscura’s My Maudlin Career, starts.

It sounds like the perfect place for this band, a celebrated practitioner of the misnamed “twee” style characterized by Prufrock- grade longing and a Phil Spector sense of insular pop majesty. Something different happens on this record, however. It’s as if the wallflower that narrates previous, understated efforts Let’s Get out of This Country and Underachievers Please Try Harder—titles that underscore the Smiths- style self-esteem issue—is taking the plunge and joining the party. “I think when we made Let’s Get Out of This Country, it changed me as a person,” says singer Traceyanne Campbell on a phone call from Poland. “There was a longing to be better or to be braver or bolder, to live life and not be scared, and making that record pushed me toward that.” With that push, Camera Obscura embodies that beautiful pop music moment of taking the plunge, complete with orchestra swell (arranged by Björn Yttling, of Peter Bjorn and John). “I think everyone is on a journey to become that person they want to be and to do those things they want to do, and I’m the same. I just want to share that.”