Versus have returned with a new record, On the Ones and Threes (to be released August 3), and a worldview darkened with the “sanitization” of both bands and music venues in their home city of New York.

On the Ones and Threes’ brooding themes are explained bluntly by Richard: “Well, I’m just a dark person, and I get more nihilistic the older I get.”

Even bassist Fontaine Toups, who assumes lead vocal duties on a handful of tracks, isn’t immune to the cynicism. On the gorgeously chiming “Scientists,” she keens, “Feeling so happy/The end will come soon” over sun-bleached melodies that belie the song’s decidedly morose sentiment.

The nihilism comes to an apex on closing track “The Ones and Threes.” As a funereal organ gives way to a cacophonous maelstrom of guitars, Richard resignedly urges, “Yes I am the number thirteen/In elevator society/Why be superstitious/When we’re all just specks of dust/You can’t help it and I can’t stop it,” as Toups’ guardian-angel backing vocals evince the band’s greatest strength: the way the pair’s voices bleed together so seamlessly. It’s the darkest song on the darkest record Versus has ever made.

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