Since emerging from the mid-2000s post-punk bubble, English quintet Editors not only continued to evolve; they eagerly altered their core DNA: After collaborating with experimental electronic producer Blanck Mass on 2018’s Violence, they enlisted him as a full-time member for 2022’s darkwave odyssey EBM. Surface, Echo & Sound sees Editors scale back to a five-piece rock-band formation, and they’ve unplugged their strobe lights and sequencers in the process—in fact, when frontman Tom Smith greets us on the acoustic title track, it sounds like he’s been up all night bingeing on Springsteen’s Nebraska box set. But even when Editors kick into more upbeat and urgent tracks like “Call It In” and “The Rush”, that earthy quality remains, as the band embrace the jangly gallop and mandolin-speckled grace of classic R.E.M. And with the splendorous, slow-ticking ballad “Shadow”, Editors deliver an “Everybody Hurts”-scaled anthem to call their own. Our Favourite Moment: Even after you’ve adjusted to this album’s more rootsy aesthetic, “Real” presents a scenario that would’ve seemed unfathomable for this band back in the 2000s—Editors as a stomp-clap folk act.