Interpol’s This Mirror Weighs a Ton Expands the Band’s Vocal and Political Range

Interpol’s eighth studio album, This Mirror Weighs a Ton, arrives as the band’s first work as a quintet. New permanent bassist Brad Truax joins Paul Banks, Daniel Kessler, Sam Fogarino, and producer/keyboardist Andrew Wyatt, and the expanded setup gives the record a wider vocal and instrumental range. Banks shares vocal lines with his wife Juliet, Kessler, and Truax, adding texture to tracks like “Sudden” and “See Out Loud.”

The album is also Interpol’s most overtly political. Where earlier records often abstracted conflict, this one names concrete subjects: artificial intelligence in “Iron City,” nature in “So Rides the Reindeer,” and drones in “Wounded Soldier.” “Sudden” crystallizes that mood with the line “open conversations that just open a gap,” a moment that fits the band’s shift toward direct commentary.

Musically, the record leans on the late-1990s R.E.M. experimental streak, from Automatic for the People through New Adventures in Hi-Fi, while keeping the post-punk undercurrent Interpol has carried since their early days. “Wake Up” turns Kessler’s descending riffs and Fogarino’s drumming into something closer to dance-punk. It’s a sharper, more outward-looking version of the band than the one heard on 2022’s The Other Side of Make-Believe.