“To make a mountain of your life is just a choice/But I never learned enough to listen to the voice that told me: Always love . . . hate will get you every time.” “Popular” is definitely the song this decade-old threesome is best known for, but “Always Love,” from Nada Surf’s 2005 The Weight Is a Gift, is the one I find (in the most Buddhist sense of the word) sublime. This band has gotten better and better over the years, and is about to release its fifth album, Lucky, on Barsuk. Earlier this month, NPR crowned the new song “See These Bones” as a Song of the Day, and its tender weight should appeal not just to talk-radio-listening adults but to everybody with an ear for “simple” indie rock made with intelligence and an uncanny sense of empathy. With Port O’Brien. RACHEL SHIMP

Wed., Jan. 30, 7:30 p.m., 2008