Interpol

The long-awaited fourth album from New York s INTERPOL finds them exploring dark musical landscapes of layered depth and intensity. In contrast to 2007 s Our Love To Admire, this self-titled opus hangs together as an album, a set of very different songs that thematically connect. From the highly melodic Barricade and Lights through the snarling Memory Serves and the extraordinary triptych of connected tracks that close the album, Interpol have never made work this emotionally resonant or packed with crescendos. Mixer Alan Moulder has brought the rhythm section back to the fore, anchoring a thicket of orchestral sound that brings to mind touchstones from black metal to 70s art rock, but always remains identifiably Interpol. Hypnotic, bizarre, always indelible, Interpol is the bands magnum opus.