Stereophonics: Keep Calm And Carry On

When Stereophonics released their official Best Of 'A Decade In The Sun' last year, we were sort of expecting it to be their swan song, their letter goodbye to a pretty damn successful ten years.

Keep Calm And Carry On goes directly against our original notion and stands as the bands newest and - would you believe it - seventh full-length album. Is it necessary? Not really. Is it any good? Surprisingly, it's not bad.

There's nothing that immediately screams brilliance, nor does the bulk of the content break any boundaries but it would be incorrect to state that the music itself was substandard as it really isn't. They've been making music for a long-time together and though frontman Kelly Jones has clearly lost a bit of his lyrical prowess over the years, we've most certainly heard worse over the course of the last twelve months. 

Introductory number She's Alright is a genuinely enjoyable track with a typically 'Phonics guitar building behind Jones' raspy vocals. It's catchy, nicely structured, a little simple but an indisputably likable 'indie-rock anthem'. We'd choose this over anything Kasabian are currently spewing all over the radio, put it that way.

Then there's the electronic slow-burner Beerbottle that sounds part robot, part Welsh-ballad, the fuzz-friendly stomper I Got Your Number, experimental penultimate crooner Stuck In A Rut and the ever-so Stereophonics-esque Uppercut. Every one of them holds their own weight and though the surrounding filler only really manages to conjure a gentle nod here and there, it's still a huge surprise to find out that they really haven't lost their touch entirely, not yet anyway.

Half of 2009's releases would honestly tear this inoffensively conventional CD to pieces but it's here that you have to break down the wall of judgement and look at it from inside it's respective field and demographic. We guarantee you every dad over the age of thirty with a penchant for nostalgic indie could get something from the LP and it's in that light that we can't help but feel a little something towards it.

There's cheesy lines, cheesier choruses and not much in the way of diversity but for what it is, it's a very well made effort.

It doesn't stand up to their earlier efforts (Performance & Cocktails and You Gotta Go There To Come Back are still miles above anything that came after them) but considering we were just about ready to seal that coffin once and for all, well, it looks like we'll be saving that last nail for another day.