The 1975 have long been promoted through hype. Their eponymous debut album, released in 2013, had great success following extensive touring, the gradual development of an army of loyal fans, and the launch of support EPs that created a substantial body of work, often centred around deeply personal lyrics. After much, much more touring, and a deletion followed by a swift reboot of all their social media using a new pink and white aesthetic, their follow-up project has finally entered their listeners’ lives: I Like It When You Sleep, for You Are So Beautiful Yet So Unaware of It. While it reads like a quotation from a Pablo Neruda poem and may well be a little overblown – as is the band’s image in general – it does encapsulate the curious mix of sentiments that come through in this record.

Whereas the band had previously focused on issues pertaining to teenagers in the popular songs ‘Chocolate’, ‘Sex’ and ‘Girls’, they have now shifted towards issues that are perhaps more mature, and which certainly give more cause for anxiety: the effects of drug use, bereavement, and the breakdown of relationships, particularly poignantly on ‘Somebody Else’, one of the highlights of the album. The move from the adolescent to the adult was difficult to manoeuvre given that many fans were disappointed with the release of the 80s-inflected ‘Love Me’ back in October. However, if the band wants to stay relevant, they need to evolve and grow alongside their young audience, which is what this release sets out to do. The band is undeniably reworking its image, and luckily enough, they have succeeded.

High points of the album include the singles ‘The Sound’, which is proving to be a fan favourite, ‘UGH!’, a scatty, lively musing on drug use, and ‘A Change of Heart’ (if you’re only going to listen to one song off the album, make it this one). While these more upbeat songs are definitely more accessible, the more ambient or instrumental songs shouldn’t be discarded. They are a tougher but similarly rewarding listen, ‘The Ballad of Me and My Brain’ being a case in point. Here and across the album, the lyrics are seriously impactful; fans with a good ear will spot the updating and reworking of some of the best lines from past songs ‘Robbers’ and ‘The City’ into ‘A Change of Heart.’

However, there are a few misses in this mix: even the most obsessive fan must admit that ‘If I Believe You’ is self-indulgent on Matty Healy’s part. It seems that the strongest songs on the album are those in which frontman Healy acknowledges, and therefore mitigates, his own pretention. This self-deprecation was the most striking and funny aspect of the video for ‘Love Me’, and is frankly the only retort to what is often the harsest criticism received by the band.

Despite its assured swagger, the album is not a faultless, five-star masterpiece. My only, barely present, criticism is that it’s difficult to read the album as a whole. Although the variety of styles used, ranging from bare acoustic melodies to heavy guitars or ambient production, is one of the album’s key strengths, it does create an incoherence that is a little unsettling. Of course, that’s probably what they were aiming for all along.