Night Life is a stunning, slow-motion, nocturnal goth record that’s dark, but also enveloping, smooth, and textured. The grooves hit hard, the bass rumbles, the synths shimmer - and the overall effect is like being wrapped in velvet while the city burns in the distance. With only two original members left, The Horrors have outlasted almost every one of their peers - and they’ve done it by growing up. This album isn’t raw or shouty. It’s elegant and focussed. The opener Ariel eventually erupts into groovy breakbeats, layered synths, and slinking guitars - all masterfully arranged so that every instrument shines without crowding the others. It’s the kind of production you only get from musicians who’ve really taken time to study their craft. Post-punk, electronic darkwave, Night Life ties together every strand of British goth brilliance, from the 80s to now, Faris Badwan’s vocals remaining glacial and deadpan. Even when the music picks up on the club-driven cuts his voice floats above it all, half-asleep and magnetic.

The storming single More Than Life feels like a direct nod to Killing Joke’s Love Like Blood, but more modern. It’s cinematic, euphoric, melancholic - a genuine synth-pop epic. The synth design across the record is phenomenal with so many beautiful, varied tones, each one dialled in for maximum emotional pull. Some tracks are fast, groovy, and danceable, others lean into reflection, and you come out of the record wanting to root for them and dig back through the catalogue and make the case that The Horrors are something close to cult legends. Night Life is proof that evolution doesn’t have to mean compromise. Sometimes, it means stepping fully into your own shadow and discovering just how luminous the dark can be.