TEENAGE FANCLUB

 
 

Teenage Fanclub have just finished their new album, Shadows, which is both reflective and uptempo, soulful and rocky, and excellent and good.


      “I’m actually happier now… we started this record about a year and a half ago and it’s been a long time coming,” he says. “I’m very happy with the way it sounds… We made the last album with John McEntire in Chicago and we didn’t take any of our equipment other than guitars. Whereas this time we took a whole load of stuff, synthesizers, the lot, and we went for it with this record. There are strings and lots and lots of harmonies, so it’s maybe back to what we did with our Grand Prix record or something like that.”


      The brilliance of Shadows, like all the best Teenage Fanclub records, is that it sounds like everything they’ve ever done and it sounds like nothing anyone else has ever done, all on one album.


Shadows may be a considered and well-put-together record, but it has all the spontaneity of Bandwagonesque. It may have a deceptively simple feel, but it’s as polished and intelligent as Grand Prix. And, despite the input of others and new ideas, it’s still a record that only the three member of Teenage Fanclub could make.


“The time we spend on a record has expanded over the years but that’s natural, 20 years ago you’re in each other’s pockets…” says Raymond, “But everything works in a certain way and this record’s spread out over a period of time.”


So welcome to Shadows, a very, very good Teenage Fanclub album.


- David Quantick


Teenage Fanclub’s new album ‘Shadows’ will be released May 31st 2010 on PeMa


Teenage Fanclub come from Glasgow and released their debut album, A Catholic Education, in 1990, then followed it with Bandwagonesque (1991), Thirteen (1993), Grand Prix (1995), Songs From Northern Britain (1997), Howdy! (2000) and Man-Made (2005)