The Delgados are nothing if not hard-working. For five years now they've toiled to make their own Chemikal Underground label a success, and their latest album took fifteen months to make, encompassing a trip to America and sessions with the producer of Mercury Rev's last album. For some bands this could signal disaster, ending in overblown and overproduced self-indulgence, unlistenable tosh acclaimed by beard-stroking musos. Thankfully, The Delgados have too much heart and soul to fall into that trap; they're not the kind of band who think they're more important than the music they make, and understatement has always been one of their most potent tools. The subtle grace of 1998's Peloton was a huge leap from the power-pop of first album Domestiques, and while this record follows on from the tone of the former, it's another step up the ladder to pop perfection. And as usual, it improves with repeated listening. Opener "The Past That Suits You Best" is like a mini-symphony, a testament to wasted lives and spent dreams. 'Bored of the truth I return to my youth', youth in this case being that familiar Glaswegian teenage suburban existence of drinking cheap alcohol and running from casuals, where nothing much ever happens but there's always a story to tell.
The album's other highlights include "No Danger", which could be about any manner of things, and the lovely "American Trilogy" (due to be the next single). The latter is a pulverising tale of a mind wracked with despair, and when Alun Woodward sings lines such as 'It's the simple things that crush/and I'm crying far too much' he might as well be sobbing into the microphone, for the effect would almost be the same. When he reaches the last line 'I'm alright now, I can even take the pain', after the earlier 'But lately I've been feeling that I'm gonna give up breathing', the effect is heartbreaking.
Most of the pretentious "I know what I'm talking about" espousing above is guess-work of course, because the Delgados' lyrics are usually so oblique that the seemingly obvious topics of songs are probably farther off the mark than one of Jocky Wilson's darts. But their ambition always amazes me, the way they cram more chord, tempo and key changes into one song than most bands manage in an album and still manage to come out with absolutely fantastic tunes at the end of it all.
Even with the new Belle & Sebastian album to come this year, I can't see much surpassing this gem. The downside to all this is that we'll probably have to wait another three years for the next one to arrive. Oh, well, wake me up when it gets here...