Stereophonics
Keep The Village Alive

The 2009 flop with "Keep Calm And Carry On" was paradoxically healthy for the career of the Welsh band Stereophonics.

Their latest album, now two years ago, "Graffiti On The Train," has brought them back (in the charts and beyond) to a level more befitting their talent, particularly the talent of Kelly Jones, frontman and sole composer of the quartet's overseas pieces.

Produced by faithful Jim Lowe along with Jones and featuring new drummer Jamie Morrison (ex-Noisettes), "Keep The Village Alive" is the band's ninth studio album. A work conceived as the "second part" of the brilliant predecessor but, over time, has become a standalone project, quite different indeed.

The opening and first single "C'est La Vie" harks back to the wild indie guitarism of the beginnings of "Word Gets Around" and "Performance And Cocktails," and ultimately sounds like a delightful closing of the circle: it quickly reveals itself to be, however, a lot of smoke and mirrors. No return to the origins for Jones and company, in fact, since already with the following "White Lies," an epic ride complete with an intro borrowed from some notebook of The Edge, it is clear that the playing field will more or less be that of the previous album, a varied fresco of styles and atmospheres.

There's a little something for everyone: a nice funky groove in the excellent "Sing Little Sister," the now-familiar Britpop ballad "I Wanna Get Lost With You" (unsurprisingly chosen as the second single), the delicate acoustic guitar and strings composition "Song For The Summer" (already presented live previously), and even a sort of quirky mini pop suite like "Sunny," which, however, hides in the middle one of Jones's hallmark killer melodies.

Few stylistic falls, almost all concentrated in the second part of the album and still with the bar always kept at a level of adequacy: they boil down to the unconvincing and overly repetitive "Fight Or Flight," and the overly saccharine pop orchestral of "My Hero." The feeling of incompleteness is nevertheless swept away by the splendid closing "Mr. And Ms. Smith," a long ballad opened by an arpeggio that quite evidently pays homage to "Here Comes The Sun" and closes on an appreciable instrumental coda.

Ultimately, a great work by Stereophonics, perhaps their best since "Language..." and the glorious "Dakota." An album that certifies their full return to a form worthy of their fame.

Best track: Sunny