Well, I am a bit at a loss after I read this Guardian interview this morning..
http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jun/28/chemical-brothers-been-together-longer-than-marriagesIt starts off as a really insightful and different article as opposed to the ususal standard q&a when a new record is about to be released. But then, all of a sudden, some sort of awkward atmosphere arises that put a huge damper on my pre-release excitement and soured my morning.
Ed makes some eerie statements about his outlook on his musical career and shows all sorts of tiredness and exhaustion with his musical past which might point to a possible... aw... can't even think that.... "divorce" ?? He keeps mentioning how hard it is to keep being excited and even (comically?) asking himself whether he's still "in" the band... Argh, I don't want to sound like a stupid pessimistic fanboy or anything but this sort of frightens me a bit. Especially phrases like this:
He’s not sure if this marks a permanent retirement but it’s disconcerting for both of them. “I’m friends with the Chemical Brothers on Facebook,” says Simons. “I’m in the Chemical Brothers! And I see the dates coming up and I’m like, Am I?” He does a double-take. “No. It’s heartbreaking, really.”
Ed, Tom! As both of you analyzed in that article that today's electronic music (or EDM, urgh) often times sounds too boring, too generic or lacks that special something, losing you guys would therefore mean a great loss of originality in that "type" genre - if there's a genre at all to put you in! I don't even want to ponder over the idea you both could leave us behind with Benni Benassi, David Guetta, Avicii and others of that ilk. You've brought something special to the table that has, to this day, been unmatched. Nobody does music like you do. It's that special sound, this passion for weird, unusual noises and the meticulousness of your producing that has always attracted me and made me keep following this musical roadtrip to this day. Your live shows are unparalleled, too. It's rarely seen that electronic artists expend so much effort to tweak and experiement with their album material for live shows that way that it almost never sounds as heard on the records.
You've made a musical impression that would be dearly missed (and needed) if it were to be ended so abruptly. I'm totally aware that keeping up such a long-term relationship isn't the easiest thing and causes frictions along the way. But maybe you could consider to do it the oldschool way like our grandmas and -pas did: Staying together no matter what?

Hopefully this is just false alarm and I'm interpreting too much into it... What's weird, though, is, I accidentally watched a video about a teen band's loss of a member the other day. While most of the commenters were mocking the pathetic fan reactions, I kept thinking to myself what it would feel like if one of my favorite bands split up?
To conclude on a funnier note, I now realize why Ed, as miloco2forum, had replied to my comment in 2007 when I mentioned that I felt the BBC take of Do It Again was a bit too long (that 7+ min version)
