In High Fidelity, John Cusack's Rob Gordon plays the Beta Band's 1998 The Three E.P.s, predicting a sale to every customer in his record shop. The Scottish group's debut was so arresting you didn't doubt the claim, but after three curiously flat follow-ups (which the group disparaged), the Beta Band dispersed after 2004's Heroes to Zeros.

Now, Astronomy for Dogs reveals the former Beta Banders to be a sort of Pink Floyd in reverse, with Aliens songwriter Gordon Anderson as their Syd Barrett. Anderson was a founding member of the Beta Band, eventually sidelined by mental illness. Later emerging as Lone Pigeon on micro-indie Fence Records, the prolific Anderson wrote and recorded with an autonomy the major label-bound Beta Band could only envy.

In 2006, Anderson reunited with ex-Betas John Maclean and Robin Jones as the Aliens. Astronomy for Dogs, their full-length debut, recaptures the whimsy and adventure of the earliest Beta Band recordings, couching songs like "Robot Man" and "The Happy Song" — simple as the outsider art songwriting of Daniel Johnston — in a manic pop sheen, evoking the multiple layers of both psychedelia and its contemporary equivalent, electronic dance music.

As much fun as it would be to play spot-the-influence on Astronomy for Dogs with a copy of Nuggets 2: Original Artyfacts from the British Empire and Beyond, it would obscure Aliens’ revitalization of the Beta Band's blueprint. Genuinely great songs like "Only Waiting" and "She Don't Love Me No More" finally live up to the promise of The Three EPs.