During my scene phase in high school, very few records hit me quite as hard as Son, I Loved You At Your Darkest. Even when I fell off of heavy music in favor of indie rock, I revisited that record quite often.

But it turns out I wasn’t the only one trading hardcore for indie rock. After losing their screamer and putting out one of the best Christian-adjacent post-hardcore records ever, As Cities Burn pulled a massive left turn and made an indie rock record. But despite this seismic shift, the group is just as emotive and cathartic as ever.

I ignored Come Now Sleep for a while after it came out, being initially turned off by the idea of them losing their screams. But when Hell or Highwater came out, my tastes had already shifted to bands like Arcade Fire, Modest Mouse, Interpol, Bloc Party, and the like.

So when I heard this record for the first time, sitting in bed with my laptop in my tiny Chicago bedroom, it felt like I was reconnecting with an old best friend and finding out their life had ended up heading the same direction. At the time, I was curating a weekly playlist on Mediafire (kids today will never understand), and more often than not, a song from this record would end up nestled between Grizzly Bear or Portishead or Deerhunter.

But since most of my listening these days is on vinyl, it’s fallen out of my regular rotation. I even deleted the files off of my laptop during a brief bout of ethical conviction about downloading albums I didn’t spend money on. Once this reissue came available, it took me longer to correct this error than it probably should. I should have preordered it. But it took literally until right now listening to it that I realized just how much this record used to mean to me.

Don’t be fooled by the talk of it being a departure—the things that made As Cities Burn As Cities Burn are still here. Cody Bonnette’s vocals are as passionate as they’ve always been. There are even a couple near screams. The instrumentation is more minimalist, adopting a post punk starkness at times, but there are still plenty of big riffs and serpentine electric guitar parts. But on top of that, they also offer up the catchiest hooks and most irresistible grooves of their career.

It’s hard to say where it lands in their full catalog: each of their records sound completely different from one another while still sounding like the same band. It’s a rare band that can operate that way, and As Cities Burn is worthy to be in that esteemed company. And so like I’ve said about bands like Sunny Day Real Estate, The Appleseed Cast, and others, the best As Cities Burn record is the one you’re listening to.

(Well, except for the reunion record.)