Fontaines D.C. - Dopamine Chamber [Blue LP2]

Two years ago, Romance turned a Dublin five-piece from critical favorites into one of the biggest bands on the planet. It debuted at No. 2 in the UK and has since gone platinum there, delivered the band their first entry on the Billboard 200, earned two GRAMMY nominations (Best Rock Album, and Best Alternative Music Performance for "Starburster"), won International Group of the Year at the 2025 BRIT Awards, took Ireland's Choice Music Prize, and landed on the Mercury shortlist. Dopamine Chamber is what they did next, and it is not a victory lap.

Produced by James Ford, the band's fifth album moves decisively away from the guitar language of their early records into something colder, stranger and more synthetic. Lead single "Marianne," announced with a video from Dave Meyers (Kendrick Lamar's "HUMBLE," Travis Scott's "SICKO MODE"), arrives like a constellation behind undulating sighs of smog: potent balladry, anthemic melodies glinting through the murk. In a world tipping toward collapse, the record asks how pleasure mutates amid peril, and what our pursuit of it reveals about us.

The title comes from the idea of a record as a room the listener steps into. "The album itself is a dopamine chamber," says Grian Chatten. "You step inside and we test these different mind- or mood-altering pieces of music on you."