Jason Mraz is living full spiral. It’s not full circle, exactly, because he’s changed and his experiences have changed, but on his eighth album, Mystical Magical Rhythmical Radical Ride, the musician has found himself returning to a familiar junction in space. The new songs, which are unabashedly pop, see Mraz reuniting with numerous collaborators, including Los Angeles band Raining Jane and producer Martin Terefe, who helmed 2008’s We Sing. We Dance. We Steal Things. In fact, as Mraz looked at the number eight, he instead saw an infinity sign.

“We’re back together, but we’re not where we were,” the musician explains. “We have new perspective and new height, so we can collaborate in a new way. I feel like I’ve completed a ring of the spiral, and now I’m starting that ride again. There’s a sense of constant unwinding and ever-moving forward that is both predicable and always uncertain.”

For Mraz, Mystical Magical Rhythmical Radical Ride is another step forward on the unpredictable journey of life. Its optimistic, inspiring sensibility reflects the musician’s overall approach to being in the world. He continues to run his organic home farm, Mraz Family Farms, which grows coffee and avocados, and his nonprofit the Jason Mraz Foundation, which has a mission of shining for inclusive arts education, food security and the advancement of equality. He donated all of the profits from Look For The Good to various charities, and actively advocates for equality, climate preservation and arts education. Mraz, a two-time Grammy winner, Songwriters Hall of Fame Honoree and spokesman for the Good Tidings Foundation, always aims to use his position to empower others and inspire real-world change and positivity. It’s something he will carry with him as he moves into the next spiral, and one after that, and into infinity.