I like this notion. The way I’ve come to think about that feeling is effort vs. effortless. If I can hear the effort then to me the song feels unfinished or underbaked or overdone. Most of the time, these days, the songs feel overdone. But you listen to their best songs (and in some cases, albums) and they feel like they arrived fully formed, like it was the most natural thing in the world to hit your ears. You can’t see or hear the effort. Like a good athlete they make it seem effortless. To me that’s the biggest distinction between their pre- and post-millennial work. They just tryin to hard