Forgiveness works in mysterious ways.

Some people “forgive” others for minor offenses, like the inevitable juvenile case of forgiving a middle school boyfriend or girlfriend for making eyes with that other person at the lunch table. In more serious cases, public officials or ex-lovers beg for forgiveness after their deceitful sins. Toronto collective Broken Social Scene takes on every aspect of forgiveness in the appropriately named Forgiveness Rock Record, the group’s first outing since 2005.

With Forgiveness, Broken Social Scene takes the tight production of its widely-acclaimed second album, 2003’s You Forgot it In People, and combines it with the loose feel from the group’s 2005 self-titled album to create something that makes the forgiveness process much easier. The album has a noticeably different feel than its last two albums, but it still sounds like classic Broken Social Scene.

With opening track “World Sick,” it becomes easy to assume the entire album will take a less personal, more in-your-face approach on a political level; frontman Kevin Drew seems pretty damn frustrated with the fact he gets “world sick, every time I take a stand.”

But Forgiveness Rock Record ultimately boils down to a deeply personal record that starts with a political statement but ends with a song about a very personal relationship. Along the way, BSS tackles everything it has seen worth writing about throughout its five-year hiatus. “Texico Bitches” takes on big oil’s greed, while “Chase Scene” sounds like a “Brave Little Toaster” song about the chaos of life.

The climactic instrumental track “Meet Me in the Basement” ranks with French band Phoenix’s “Love Like a Sunset” as one of the best pop instrumentals in recent memory, and it easily makes up for the album’s relative lack of instrumental tracks compared to past BSS records.

No song on Forgiveness reaches higher than “Sentimental X’s,” one of the year’s best songs no one will ever hear. The song is subtly emotional — describing the universally understood feeling of falling out of contact with someone once loved so much — all with an eerie guitar line that combines a Talking Heads-esque groove with a soaring finish that sounds like U2 in its Joshua Tree days.

Throughout its career, Broken Social Scene has made some music that can only be described as inspiring. Songs like “7/4 (Shoreline)” and “Anthems for a Seventeen Year-old Girl” have become favorites in the indie community over the last several years and for good reason. Somehow, with Forgiveness Rock Record, BSS has downsized, refocused and released music that holds up as some of the best material it has ever recorded.

So far, 2010 has already been an impressive year for music. Well-established bands like Vampire Weekend and Gorillaz have released albums that in most years would have been considered some of the best of the year. But this is no normal year. Broken Social Scene is back, and five years was enough time for this group to make one of the year’s best records.

41/2 stars out of 5.