Tops: Bury The Key (muck coloured vinyl) LP

Montréal's TOPS write timeless music that reliably threads immediacy and depth. "Bury The Key", their first full-length since 2020 and with new label home Ghostly International, is a captivating reintroduction for the band: ever refined, undoubtedly masters of their melodic craft yet unafraid of evolving and testing themselves against different, at times darker tones. The album faces feelings once locked away, engaging the give-and-take between happiness, hedonism, and self-destruction. While often inhabited by fictional figures, their glowing, grooving, self-produced songs draw from personal observations: intimacy (both inside and outside the band), toxic behavior, drug use, and apocalyptic dread. Through the lens of a looming epoch and the clarity that comes with age, TOPS dip into a more sinister disco realm with "Bury The Key", giving their soft-focus sophisti-pop a sharpened edge.