Artwork for the twilight sad's album it’s the long goodbye

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For decades songs that unrepentantly wanted to touch our feelings were looked down upon as unsophisticated and naïve. The Twilight Sad have returned to that place, because they felt there was nowhere else to go.

In a divided world where our first instinct is to show a hard shell, The Twilight Sad’s lyricist and singer James Graham has an ambition many would be wary of.

“I want to be a relatable person that talks about things that can happen and give an opportunity for people to go, well, you’re not alone…to know that I’m saying things that connect with other people, that’s such a powerful thing.”

In speaking so candidly about himself, Graham is also describing the opportunity The Twilight Sad’s first album in seven years has afforded him.

Now from a writing perspective a duo with Andy MacFarlane responsible for their music, this tight creative relationship has in It’s The Long Goodbye allowed them to make a record which Graham is happy to admit, ‘Comes from a place of raw emotion’.

Those feelings relate to his mother’s battle with dementia and subsequent passing; a loss contrasted with the happiness caused by his own new marriage and subsequently becoming a father.

Given the elapsed time, we can guess that following up 2019’s IT WON/T BE LIKE THIS ALL THE TIME was evidentially a winding road, with the London-based MacFarlane storing up and sharing ideas as far back as lockdown.

Once the material fully formed however, the actual sessions at Willesden’s Battery Studios lasted only two highly focused weeks.

What emerges is The Twilight Sad record which they’ve always threatened to make but for reasons unknown ultimately pulled back from in the past.

Fuelled by a new desire to leave nobody behind, on it despair and grief are catalysts for a stark portrayal of personal collapse, whilst the arrangements are despite that backdrop somehow thrilling and unapologetically reaching out for human connection.

Opener GET AWAY FROM IT ALL hits like a wave almost from the first second, overwhelming guitars on guitars dragging the listener into a current which pulls in every direction.

Heartbreakingly, at the end Graham repeats in desolation, ‘You’re my mother’, as if a familial bond so strong could be too easily broken.

Fuelled by confusion and the need to carry on but not knowing how, ATTEMPT AT A CRASH LANDING – THEME surges, a horse scared by firecrackers, running wild and with no heed for self-preservation.

Meanwhile, Robert Smith’s devotion to the band has been far from a secret. This close friendship manifests itself with multi-instrumental guest spots on WAITING FOR THE PHONE CALL, BACK TO FOURTEEN and also the epic, Cure-esque brilliance of DEAD FLOWERS.

It’s hard to imagine whistling that on a bus, yet there are many things here that can almost be reached out and touched.

Foremost on this list is INHOSPITABLE/HOSPITAL, a track which lands in the hinterland between spiky post-punk and wispy shoegaze, a coming up for air if one is needed.

Closer TV PEOPLE STILL THROWING TVS AT PEOPLE finds Graham bereft, blankly intoning, ‘I keep hiding/In My nightmare’, doubt and regret in the Kid A synths, introspection succumbed to a hard-edged finale that threatens to bring everything around it right down into the ground.

For decades songs that unrepentantly wanted to touch our feelings were looked down upon as unsophisticated and naïve.

The Twilight Sad have on It’s The Long Goodbye returned to that place, because they felt there was nowhere else to go.

It is an uncomfortable, dangerous place for anyone to be in 2026, but the record it caused is, without coincidence, undoubtedly the best they’ve ever made and the most complete journey they’ve ever taken us on.