They’re natural questions.

Last month marked the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, and Philly indie rock band the Capitol Years released an album called Dance Away the Terror the following day, Sept. 12. Was the title influenced by the aftermath of those events, and was the record meant to coincide with the five-year milestone?

The answers, somewhat expectedly, are no and no.

The Capitol Years aren’t an activist band, so it makes sense that a phrase like Dance Away the Terror ends up more personal than political. To clarify: “I suppose if people don’t know our personalities, it’s not so easy to get,” lead singer and songwriter Shai Halperin says. “I came up with the title over a year-and-a-half ago. One should just consider the line, ‘Dance away the terror as the terror dances your way,’ and start from there.”

The line he’s referring to is found in the title track, an atmospheric piano-and-guitar tune that builds steam as it mopes along, and again in “As the Terror Dances Your Way,” an upbeat rocker that plays it straight until it spirals into psychedelic discordance near the end. Together the songs resemble a musical palindrome. If we’re looking for easy answers, we should stop now.

The rest of Dance Away the Terror plays with a similar quiet-loud-quiet dynamic. The chugging “Revolutions” follows the introverted title track; the wispy “Chandelier” is a reprieve after the more brazen “Long Time” and “Mirage People.” At their core, the Capitol Years are full of ’60s-inspired melodies and light, breezy textures, and Dance Away shines best when it doesn’t try to hide its influences, but rather, adjust them. It happens wonderfully on “It’s Only Loveless,” which apes the similarly-titled Beatles song, “It’s Only Love,” in both name and chord structure.

Of the appropriation, Halperin says: “There are plenty of songs out there that borrow, lift, or outright steal from other songs. It’s part of art and it’s certainly part of our culture. I’ve had issues with other songs, and with things I may hear on the radio or elsewhere, but with this…I’m fine.”

Dance Away the Terror is the Capitol Years’ first album (fourth overall since Halperin formed the band as a one-man venture in 2001) on Schwenksville, Pa.-based Park the Van Records. The label moved to Pennsylvania after their office in New Orleans was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina last August. (On their website, Park the Van downplays the incident with the typical come-what-may attitude that’s become synonymous with indie rock: “Lame. Sad. Frustrating and somewhat of a setback,” the “about” section of the site reads.)

But moving to Pennsylvania did provide some convenience: it meant the label was now in the same state as five of its six signed acts, including other Philly bands such as Dr. Dog, The Teeth, and National Eye.

Dr. Dog’s new EP, Takers and Leavers, came out the same day the Capitol Years released Dance Away the Terror. Besides the obvious, the two records share other points of common interest: both bask in ’60s love-harmony culture; both rely on the lo-fi marriage of guitar and piano as a backdrop; both are slow to warm up to and then, without warning, impossible to resist.

With six songs and a running time of 23 minutes, Takers and Leavers is almost exactly two-thirds the length of its 2005 full-length predecessor, Easy Beat (which clocked in at nine songs and 37 minutes). But it works better as an appendage, not a new chapter; Dr. Dog still wants people to like them for being Dr. Dog. On the opening track, “Ain’t It Strange,” the band wastes no time getting sentimental: “Ain’t it a shame / How a thought can catch the breeze and blow away?” It’s a statement unlikely to hold up: such thoughts are much more grounded now.