It’s nearly impossible to come up with a reasonable general description of Apostle of Hustle’s third album, Eats Darkness, so why not just leave it to Andrew Whiteman himself: “Eats Darkness is a serial poem about some struggles that people go through.”

That’s as good an explanation as any for the interludes that capture the sound effects of car crashes, gunfire and sirens scattered throughout an album of completely unrelated songs. Eats Darkness sounds more like an audiophile’s snobbery-induced mix CD than it does a studio release by one band.

Darkness finds Whiteman continuing along his trajectory of groove- and dub-infused indie rock, this time inserting some true pop winners. Both “Soul Unwind” and “Xerses” are legitimately catchy, though neither has the quirky charm of the Cuban-influenced Eazy-E shout out “Eazy Speaks.” Other songs like “Whistle in the Fog” and the title track are quiet and rambling, while “How to Defeat a More Powerful Enemy” has some Buddy Holly charisma lingering below a fuzzy surface.

I won’t presume to know whether this album is the sound of Andrew Whiteman finding his voice or losing his mind, but one thing is certain — Eats Darkness is really fucking good. The co-founder of Broken Social Scene who earned the nickname, Apostle of Hustle, has put all pretension and expectation aside and made an album that is disjointed, themeless and compulsively listenable. The formula and concept are a mess. The results are undeniable.