Imagine having the kind of self-consciousness and anxiety that traps you, makes you doubt yourself, straight-up compels you to tell your listeners they might not like what you’re doing — and then trying to work through all those feelings in the club, where you long to lose yourself in a crowd you’re not entirely comfortable in, even when you’re actually the one in the booth tasked with making them dance. That’s not the only mood Loraine James’ third album brings to the fore, but it feels like the most powerful one — right there at the heart of Reflection sits “Self Doubt (Leaving the Club Early).” a glitchy-yet-glimmering collision of quick-panning beats suffused with Vangelis-synth melancholy and whisper-mumbled lyrics about how her sound clears dancefloors. It’s a masterful shock in the midst of an album that barely even feinted towards anxiety from the go — not when the first three cuts (Xzavier Stone-featuring club-conquest opener “Built to Last,” juke-refracting instrumental “Let’s Go,” and the hazy, questioning “Simple Stuff”) build on the promise of her experimental bass attacks as a new way to sound joyfully anthemic. But the club itself starts to feel like a fading abstraction as pandemic-era isolation (“Reflection”) and the weight of relentless police violence (expressed by a wounded-sounding Iceboy Violet on “We’re Building Something New”) permeate the second half, until even the things people expect you to do out of social obligation or personal challenge feel like too much to take (“Running Like That,” featuring Eden Samara in top soaring-yet-aching alt-pop form). Still, fighting oppressive anxiety with music this visionary and welcoming, this confrontationally defiant, is the kind of approach that benefits the listeners and James herself — the tracks are tough, forward-looking, and demanding to be heard, even when we can’t bring ourselves to be.