On their low-key fourth album, the EDM duo do some growing up

For their fourth studio record The Chainsmokers flipped the script. Instead of taking the usual EDM route, filling out most tracks with featured vocalists (as they did on 2019’s World War Joy with massive guests like blink-182 and Ty Dolla $ign), the duo opted to strip things down to bare essentials. Although there’s still plenty of collaboration, with songwriters like Emily Warren and Coldplay’s Chris Martin involved, the focus of So Far So Good is all on Drew Taggart and Alex Pall. And the result is one of the most cohesive and personal records of their career.

It’s also calmer, quieter and more reflective than their previous albums, and largely devoid of club bangers and giant drops. The Chainsmokers of So Far So Good are looking at the themes that have always preoccupied them—loneliness, alienation, bad romance, etc.—but through a more mature lens. The emo-inflected pop of lead single “High” isn’t low-key, per se, but it is definitely low-key for a Chainsmokers single, as Taggart laments a toxic relationship, while “iPad” is a dreamier take on big-city isolation than fans of the duo might expect. There’s less of the darkness that defined albums like 2018’s Sick Boy and, perhaps, even a feeling of acceptance. Things might be rough sometimes, but on So Far So Good it sounds like no one is taking that to mean the end of the world is nigh.

On the contrary—a lot of the time the duo sound like they’re straight-up glowing.The intimacy fears of ”If You’re Serious” are backdropped by ultra-romantic synths. “I Love You” is all swelling pulses and bright key lines that make even the minor melancholy feel warm. And “The Fall”, with Ship Wrek, offers up a dance floor-primed tropical beat. In 2023, The Chainsmokers would bring back the buddies with Summertime Friends, but So Far So Good proved they could go their own way, too.