atinée Recordings takes toyingly charming to a new level. The label houses bands with monikers such as The Snowdrops and Airport Girl, produces album art featuring idyllic1950s scenes (folks in queue at a picture house, beachgoers crowding a vacation locale), and sends you a free postcard with each purchase.

Naturally, a label with such an aesthetic reminds of C86’s twee pop inclusions—evoking bowl and bob haircuts, shambling Bristol, and bashfully blushing teenage days. Headquartered in Santa Barbara, Calif., and churning out product for nearly a decade now, Matinée has ably reanimated that movement’s candid, confectionary sensibilities, much to the delight of avowed zealots everywhere.

Matinée’s latest release is from Math and Physics Club, which holds the distinction of being the first American act inked by the label. Fittingly, the backbone of the quintet—vocalist Charles Bert and guitarist James Werle—hails from Olympia, hometown of Beat Happening’s Calvin Johnson and a community that experienced an indie pop groundswell of its own in the mid- to late-1980s.

Johnson is certainly a major influence here, as the lyrics from Math and Physics Club reveal similar diaristic indulgences: earnest, schoolboy avowals detailing moments of long-gone infatuations and subterranean insecurities. MAPC’s songs sniff of newly sharpened pencils, burning leaves on autumn strolls, and cheap, department store perfume.

On “La La La Lisa,” Bert echoes the affability and wit of a Stuart Murdoch: “She was selling T-shirts at the punk rock show / I spent half the night thinking of some clever line / And waiting at the back of the queue / I lost my nerve and let the next boy through.” On “Last Dance,” a girl has finally been ensnared, though she’s pushing to depart: “Problems, baby we'd had some / Who hasn't / Just pull off your shoes and your glasses / Before the moment passes.” There are predictable descents into full-on schmaltz, but these are infrequent thanks to the detached coolness of Bert’s voice, which calls to mind The Field Mice’s Robert Wratten.

Musically, MAPC are taking a plaintive amble down the same serene path as labelmates Harper Lee and The Lucksmiths, employing weepy electric guitar, lazily strummed acoustic, plush drumming, and quiet bass lines. Piano and violin flourishes accentuate tracks such as “You’ll Miss Me” (the album’s best), “I Know What I Want,” and “Cold as Minnesota,” while the opening to “Such a Simple Plan” comes off as a fey-ed up version of The Cure’s seminal tale of teen turmoil, “Boys Don’t Cry.”

Reviews of MAPC’s two EPs (both released in 2005) are peppered with references to the band’s Sarah Records-like panache. And while this Northwest outfit fails to step away from the shadows of idols and achieve full singularity (unlike that label’s heavyweights; e.g. the aching beauty of The Orchids, the vitality of The Sea Urchins, Another Sunny Day’s sense of irony), Math and Physics Club will definitely satisfy those twee pop fans who keep their anoraks in mothballs.