The Neighbourhood

After five years away, The Neighbourhood return with (((((ultraSOUND))))) — a record that feels less like a comeback than a renewal. The California band that defined black-and-white pop melancholy in the 2010s has found color again, or at least shades of it.

(((((ultraSOUND))))) captures Jesse Rutherford, Zach Abels, Jeremy Freedman, Mikey Margott, and Brandon Fried reconnecting after a three-year hiatus. “We didn’t have to make this record,” Abels says. “We came back because we wanted to. It was like being in the garage again — fun and not so controlled.”

Across fifteen tracks, the band strips back the gloss and trusts feeling over flash. “Private” — the song that gives the album its name — folds self-examination into a hypnotic pulse. “Sometimes I didn’t have the words,” Rutherford says. “You’d need an ultrasound to see what I was feeling — to look inside and go, oh, that’s what’s happening.”