Semisonic Ups Its Pop Lilt With Strong Shot of Feelings

If there’s one lesson Semisonic frontman Dan Wilson has taken to heart, it’s that the most enduring pop counters its sprightliness with an equal dose of melancholy. Which is why his deceptively clever song craft contains much-needed emotional heft; even when Semisonic’s material shamelessly panders to the riff lover in us all, it remains grounded in regret and longing.

At the Troubadour on Wednesday, the Minneapolis-based trio offered an exemplary set of tightly constructed pop that vacillated between euphoria and resignation, but never lost a smidgen of momentum. Alternating songs from its 1996 release, “Great Divide,” and its new album, “Feeling Strangely Fine,” Semisonic sang of hushed intimacies (“Completely Pleased”), broken dreams (“California”) and last chances (the hit single “Closing Time”) in songs that combined sturdy melodies with sly, symmetrical riffs.

Possessor of a perfect pop voice whose reedy upper register echoes Todd Rundgren’s, Wilson frequently seemed to be at cross-purposes with his material, throwing in gratuitous guitar skronk in the middle of pithy songs that didn’t lend themselves to free-form jamming. Still, his wistful vignettes connected more often than not, and offered proof that Semisonic has vaulted to the front ranks of great contemporary pop bands.