In an age of spectacle and artificially generated “art,” I Built You a Tower offers cathartic millennial nostalgia that unknowingly celebrates human imperfections. The album feels refreshingly underproduced and unfiltered, including songs that sound like demos and the occasional vulnerable voice crack from lead vocalist Ben Gibbard.

Tracks like “Full of Stars” and “Stone Over Water” are instrumentally clean and understated while lyrically poetic and evocative, in a way that feels reminiscent of fan favourites from decades past. In an album that explores the irrepressible nature of grief, these tidier tracks reflect the necessity of compartmentalizing something that can’t truly be contained, whereas low-fi and feedback-heavy songs like “Riptides” and “How Heavenly A State” unleash these unruly feelings with distorted guitar that comes about as close as Death Cab has ever come to heavy metal.

Their first album produced by an indie label in 20 years, I Built You a Tower is an exploration of new directions and a return to the band’s roots. It sounds like something you’ve heard before, but in a good way. Death Cab doesn’t need to break the mold when they’re the ones who made it.