Broken Social Scene Finds Collective Catharsis on Remember the Humans

Reuniting with the producer who helmed their most iconic work, Toronto’s premier indie-rock collective delivers a sprawling, vulnerable masterpiece

For nearly a decade, the massive, shape-shifting entity known as Broken Social Scene has kept its collective engine idling. They have always been a project that operates outside the standard boundaries of a traditional band, gathering mass and surfacing only when the internal creative gravity demands it. That long winter of silence has officially broken with Remember the Humans, the collective's sixth full-length studio album and their first since 2017’s Hug Of Thunder. Spanning 12 tracks, it is a record that doesn't just embrace the band's signature, ungovernable chaos—it uses it to construct a fortress of communal healing.

The secret weapon behind the record's profound resonance is the return of producer David Newfeld, the sonic architect who helmed the band’s legendary breakthrough You Forgot It in People (2002) and their self-titled 2005 follow-up. Reconnecting after nearly twenty years, co-founder Kevin Drew and Newfeld found their reunion punctuated by a devastating parallel reality: both men lost their mothers during the album's two-and-a-half-year recording process. This heavy shroud of shared grief ultimately stripped away any remaining pretense, pushing the collective into a space of raw, unfiltered honesty that anchors the entire project.

From the very first moments of the album, Newfeld's signature production style—bouncing with a childlike, infectious energy—is unmistakable. The opening track and lead single, "Not Around Anymore," charges forth with a deliberate, driving groove. While Drew sings about the evaporation of possibility and a world where "it's all gone away," the music itself pushes back against the weight of nostalgia, flooding the track with brilliant, soaring layers of horns and guitars. It is the perfect thesis statement for a record deeply concerned with the analog fact of human presence in an increasingly digitized culture.

As always, Broken Social Scene thrives by relinquishing total control to the collective. While Drew serves as the emotional driver, an elite rotation of core collaborators steps directly into the spotlight. Lisa Lobsinger infuses the propulsive "Relief" with a flurry of sci-fi synthesizers and live drums that create a brilliant blur of ecstatic kinetic energy. Meanwhile, "And I Think Of You" takes a gorgeous detour into full-blown jazz interludes, showcasing the band’s enduring appetite for sonic adventure.

The record's most hauntingly beautiful moments arrive courtesy of Leslie Feist. On the late-album standout "What Happens Now," her spectral, deconstructed country-folk vocals drift through a hazy mist of warm guitar fuzz and muted percussion, offering a tender elegy that handles grief with a devastatingly light touch. By the time the final notes of the quiet, lullaby-esque closer "Parking Lot Dreams" fade out, the overwhelming takeaway is that this 20-plus musician organism has somehow bypassed the trap of self-parody. Remember the Humans is an adult record in the absolute best sense—wounded, contradictory, and entirely unoptimized—proving that even in their silver years, Broken Social Scene's magnificent, chaotic community is still a vital place to find shelter.

Sources:

• Killbeat Music
• Stereogum  
• Metacritic  
• Stereoboard