SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
The news we bring you can be pretty heavy a lot of days. The band Fontaines D.C. has been trying to make sense of it in their music.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "ONE MAN")
FONTAINES DC: (Singing) Dopamine chamber, just tryna kill the pain. You can't escape the feeling once you've given it a name. Dirty red sky...
DETROW: The new album from Fontaines D.C. is called "Dopamine Chamber." It is out today. Celia Gregory of WNXP in Nashville is here to talk about it for our New Music Friday segment. Hey, Celia.
CELIA GREGORY, BYLINE: Hey there, Scott.
DETROW: So tell us a little bit about Fontaines D.C. And as somebody of Washington D.C., is that what it stands for or not so much?
GREGORY: No. In this case, it's Dublin City.
DETROW: OK.
GREGORY: They are an Irish rock band, beloved by critics, but has, like, this exploded fan base in the last few years. And what started as sort of a spiky, post-punk bar band has shapeshifted over time, and there are electronics, drama. And "Dopamine Chamber" is the group's fifth album, the first after that breakthrough in 2024 called "Romance." So now they're playing, Scott, to, like, the biggest crowds, headlining festivals, and they've even grown into a sound that adopts Rosalia, the global pop superstar, on a duet on this one. It's really pretty.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WHERE IS GONE?")
FONTAINES DC AND ROSALIA: There's no way I'm going back to how I feel.
DETROW: So you're talking about how this band is evolving. How does that come through in this new album? How does it differ from their previous work?
GREGORY: Yeah, well, you know, they've maintained this moodiness. In Grian Chatten's voice, there's, like, a suspicious, often haunting tone that pairs with the dark sounds.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "INTIMATE")
FONTAINES DC: (Singing) Saw the sun fading out. All the people full of doubt. Beauty kings...
GREGORY: But there are moments of lightness here that seems strategic, like piano parts and string parts. And dominantly, it's really robust in production because they have more synths than guitars, so, like, on songs like "Mimesis."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MIMESIS")
FONTAINES DC: (Singing) I've driven such a long, long way here. Your indifference won't make me disappear.
DETROW: Tell me a little bit more about these dark lyrics you're mentioning. Is that how they're dealing with all of the depressing headlines we all work through?
GREGORY: Yeah, absolutely. Chatten said directly that these lyrics came from, quote, "while screens overwhelmed the band with disturbing information. AI, environmental collapse, extreme wealth, and political violence arrive riding the same algorithms as memes, jokes and celebrity culture." So clearly, that has influenced some of these lyrics that he has. But there's a lot of, like I said, lightness, and he spent some time in Italy tracking these vocals. So there is, like, an old world romance or, like, an uptick in hope, almost, that means that overall, it doesn't feel bad. It's quite layered, lush. And I've decided now, a couple of listens in, it's more pretty than it is paranoid.
DETROW: Yeah, the band talked to Ann Powers about that on MORNING EDITION this morning, and they had an interesting quote.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
GRIAN CHATTEN: Things acquire their meaning because they're ephemeral, because they're transient, you know? Like, people love each other fiercely because they know that they're going to get old and die.
GREGORY: Yeah, and this thesis statement from the interview makes me love the record even more and appreciate the band's growth. And I feel like this balance they have with the intensity and then some surprise release - in a song like "Happy For You," it just builds and builds, and it opens up halfway through. Overall, I feel like there's always something interesting that draws me back in with "Dopamine Chamber."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HAPPY FOR YOU")
FONTAINES DC: (Singing) So you know, I'm just happy for you, I swear.
DETROW: That was Celia Gregory of WNXP in Nashville, talking about "Dopamine Chamber," a new album out today from the band Fontaines D.C. Celia, thank you so much.
GREGORY: Thank you so much.
DETROW: And you can hear about more great new releases on the New Music Friday podcast from NPR Music.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HAPPY FOR YOU")
FONTAINES DC: (Singing) Of all of the people, I want you to know me. Reality doеs not pay. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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