[4] Grian Chatten told Mojo that they decided to step away from their Irish-centric themes for the album as it would have been too difficult to "sound like Ireland" while crafting a futuristic and dystopian vision called Romance.

Drummer Tom Coll said that Romance was, in some ways, like the band's first-ever studio record in that they deliberately moved away from their long-held "if we can't play it live, let's not do it" mentality.

[6] The lyrics to "Here's the Thing" were built off the back of an argument between Chatten and O'Connell, and "In the Modern World" was inspired by Lana Del Rey's "strain of disillusionment".

[7] Frontman Grian Chatten noted the influence of Dylan Thomas and the book Land Sickness by Nikolaj Schultz[8][9] as well as the films Sunset Boulevard, The Great Beauty and Wings of Desire on his lyricism.

"[2] Guitarist Conor Curley found himself listening to much of Massive Attack and Portishead, as well as "Freedom Fighter" by Bowery Electric – feeling inspired by music that's already considered "classic".

Drummer Tom Coll got "set off on a hip-hop vibe" – partially due to playing drums on the Kneecap album Fine Art – and immersed himself in grunge, going on to say he "probably left the house [Recording Studio] only three times in three weeks".

[2] "In the Modern World" is inspired by Akira's "depiction of apocalyptic emotion", with Chatten mentioning "..I can hear the buildings collapsing."

You have a lot of films like Drop Dead Gorgeous about American Beauty pageants, but you don't really have that in Britain or Ireland, that kind of hyper-femininity meets violence.

I wanted it to be Lost Boys but Girls.Keith Cameron of Mojo rated it 4 out of 5 stars, stating, "Inspired by Japanese manga and Italian cinema, the Irish quintet's fourth searches for truth in a world gone wrong."

"[19] Shaun Curran, while writing for Record Collector, gave the album 4 stars out of 5, concluding, "It's startling to think how far Fontaines D.C. have travelled creatively in five years, through an agitated, restlessness, a vivid imagination and courage to try the new."

But it doesn't sacrifice any of the band's potency in the process: thrillingly, it still carries the same grimy, careworn, aggressive qualities as their previous work.