From the Great Wall to the Forbidden City and Tian’anmen Square, British band Keane checked the capital out like most other foreigners who had just arrived to a new country – but when they played at two performances in Beijing last week, the Chinese audiences singing along reminded them that they were no strangers here.

It was the first time that the popular rock band had set foot on the Chinese mainland, where thousands of fans had listened to their music since middle school and were keen to see them live – but oddly they chose to do so only at invitation-only performances. The band played a brief set at the exclusive (and much-vaunted) Burberry launch party before playing a second, weekend gig at Beijing’s Tango-Star Live club, yet another private party; this time to celebrate the eighth birthday of local radio show Hit FM.

“I was surprised when I heard of Keane’s performance in China. I started to listen to their music five or six years ago,” said 25-year-old Su Lang, who was fortunate enough to win tickets to the event from the popular CRI channel. “If you listen to British pop, or British rock, there is no way you can skip Keane.”

Although the band has definitely won mainstream success with sales STET 10 million, their piano-led melodies and resistance to the traditional electric guitar sound has set them apart from other commercial bands and perhaps, to some extent, explains their success.

“Music is what’s most important and everything else take second place. If the music is good, then you can do whatever you want,” drummer Richard Hughes told the Global Times, before making a pointed reference to Lady Gaga. “You can be very creative, getting carried into a ceremony in an egg or wearing ridiculous clothing. [But] if you can bring some originality into it, then fashion or whatever can [go] along with it too.”

It’s been two years since their last studio album, Perfect Symmetry – not counting 2010 EP Night Train – and Hughes suggested it might be another year’s wait hence for their fourth.

“We don’t think it will come out this year… maybe next year,” said Hughes.

“As soon as you have a deadline, you start to make mistakes. We are just trying to get the music finished first and then worry about the release.”

Keane performed most of their hit songs at Hit FM’s party, such as “Everybody’s Changing” and “Somewhere Only We Know” in an otherwise short 40-minute performance. The fully packed club saw around 1,000 fans singing, cheering, screaming and sweating in the relatively small venue. The fans consisted of an almost equal mix of female and male youngsters, but also spotted among the crowd was a middle-aged Chinese man losing himself in the music.

Lead singer Tom Chaplin expressed surprise to find so many fans in China, unaware of the thousands more, perhaps, watching over the Web and blogging about how excited and disappointed they were. But maybe Chaplin’s informal promise of a future concert served as a comfort for them.

“This will be the first of many, many visits to this amazing country,” Chapman told the audience. “We have had an incredible treat in China. We hope to come back and play some more next time.”

Keane is a band to watch – as was evident at its debut show in Beijing on Saturday night.

Pointing a finger toward the crowd at Starlive, the lead vocalist Tom Chaplin sang, “But everybody’s changing. And I don’t feel the same”, as more than 1,000 fans sang and chanted. It was a moment of mutual affirmation.

“We didn’t expect you would sing along with us,” Chaplin said, addressing the crowd. During the one-and-a-half-hour performance, he sang nearly 20 songs from their previous massively successful albums. Some of the standout moments of the night were heart-tugging anthems, including This is the Last Time, She has No Time and Bend and Break.

Keyboardist, pianist Tim Rice, drummer Richard Hughes, bassist Jesse Quin, and Chaplin closed the night with the hit song, Somewhere Only We Know.

“We will come back soon,” Chaplin said, waving goodbye to fans.

“If U2′s Bono is a spiritual hero like God in heaven, then Keane are angels. Their music is so British and the singer’s voice is so beautiful,” said Liu Bo, 25, a fan.

Compared with the band’s first show in Beijing a week ago, a commercial event for Burberry, its performance on April 16 was “much more musical, which allowed us to feel the crowds and do the music”, said Rice, who is the band’s main songwriter.

“We hadn’t done a live show for four months and it was really exciting to see the crowds here in Beijing.”

The trio – Rice, Chaplin and Hughes – began making music together as teenagers. They were found by Fierce Panda Records’ founder, Simon Williams (who also discovered Coldplay), in 2003 and offered a contract. That led to the debut album Hopes and Fears, in 2004, which catapulted Keane to world fame, selling almost 6 million copies and picking up many awards.

“We didn’t expect all this success. For us, it was great enough to put our first album out and release it,” Rice said.

The second album, Under the Iron Sea, topped the UK’s album charts. The third album, Perfect Symmetry and fourth, Night Train, are loaded with songs the four musicians from Battle, East Sussex, created between gigs, showing yet another sonic swerve, but staying close to the heavily piano-based sound which has earned them the name “the band with no guitars”.

“It was an accidental success in some ways. Because we didn’t have a guitarist at the beginning and I am good at piano,” Rice said. “It was a surprise to find that things work out without guitar.”

The band played in 28 countries and regions in 2010, from Russia, Australia and Columbia, to South Korea and Lebanon.

“We are always absorbing the influences from all around,” Rice said. “We would head to studios and work on tracks any time there was a gap in our schedule. That’s what we love.”

February 28, 2010
Arjan Writes

Keane’s “Night Train” sounds like a record the British trio had to make to get some musical urges out of their system. Listening to this album, it seems that after producing some of pop’s most gorgeous ballads ever, the group wanted to let loose, let their hair down and have some fun with it.

The result is a very diverse pop record that is a classy, accomplished blend of musical styles, global rhythms and exciting new soundscapes – ranging from ’80s flavored electro-pop to energetic acoustic rock to their signature pop balladry. Following the excellent “Perfect Symmetry,” this new effort demonstrates once again that Tom Chaplin, Tim Rice Oxley and Richard Hughes are able to keep their new music fresh and invigorated while always presenting a sound that is undeniable their own.

To be released in the U.S. on May 11, the album also includes Somali rapper K’Naan and Japanese baile funk emcee Tigarah who add a distinct global flavor to “Night Train.” Pretty fitting as most of this record was written and recorded while the group was touring across the globe last year. Here a quick run-down of the album’s 8 tracks that make up Keane’s fourth studio album:

Your Love
A throbbing, mid-tempo ’80s flavored synth-pop gem that features the rare lead vocals of Tim Rice-Oxley. At first his voice took me off guard as his style and vocal inflection is very similar to Tom Chaplin’s, but his vocals are smoother, slicker. Reminiscent of A-ha’s Morten Harket. Gorgeous, sparkly chorus and an epic middle eight that sent chills up my spine. Very good and a track that clearly echoes the melodic sentiments of “Hopes & Fears.” This is one of my favorite tracks on “Night Train” and will certainly be a fan favorite as well.

Stop For Minute
This celebratory track features the much-anticipated collaboration with Somali rapper K’Naan. The song is unmistakable a Keane production though with its instantly catchy piano-driven melody. K’Naan duets with Tom in the verses and chorus of the song, and lays down some rhymes during the bridge towards the end of the song. “Stop For Minute” packs a powerful, positive message and has a great singalong chorus.

My Shadow
Third track on the album is a signature Keane ballad that primarily relies on Tim’s pacing piano work and Tom’s angelic vocals. A great reminder of why Keane is a world-class band. So beautiful. “Shine a light on me and you will see my shadow on every wall,” Tom sings.

Looking Back
Fun, brassy tune with a stomping horn section. Has a bit of bossa nova flavor to it. Would not be surprised if the guys wrote this during their South American tour dates. K’Naan adds a few of his raps, which is unexpected but totally works.

Ishin Denshin (You’ve Got To Help Yourself)
A very joyous electro-pop cover of the Yellow Magic Orchestra song that features Japanese baile funk MC Tigarah. This song was a truly international endeavor. Tim worked on the original idea on a plane, Richard recorded the drums in D.C., Tom did his vocals in Copenhagen, Tigarah did hers in L.A. and the group finished it off on a tour bus. I must say that the result feels a little disjointed – Tigarah’s vocals don’t gel all that well with Tom’s.

House Lights
Brief atmospheric interlude without vocals. Has a great cinematic quality to it.

Clear Skies
This song features Keane like you rarely hear them. Song starts off acoustically with handclaps, guitars and Tom’s vocals, which gradually build to the chorus when drums, bass and xylophone are added. This is a really fun experimentation with different instruments that works well and continues to grow on me the more I hear it. You can hear how bands like Radiohead and Blur inspired this track.

Back In Time
The tracks opens with frantic, jagged synths much like the opening of “Is It Any Wonder” that is repeated in the chorus. “Back In Time” is how Keane does rock and roll.

Story filed Wednesday, 10 February 2010

1. They’re calling it an EP but it’s got eight tracks (EIGHT TRACKS) on it and three of them could be obvious singles so let’s be honest here, it’s an album. Full tracklisting: ‘House Lights’, ‘Back In Time’, ‘Stop For A Minute’ (feat K’Naan), ‘Clear Skies’, ‘Ishin Denshin (You’ve Got To Help Yourself)’ (feat Tigarah), ‘Your Love’, ‘Looking Back’ (feat K’Naan), ‘My Shadow’. We had a bit of a chit-chat with the band last week and put forward our ‘it’s clearly an album what are you talking about’ opinion; Tim from the band mentioned that he agreed with something Liam Gallager recently said about the constraints of the modern music industry meaning that bands don’t really get to release enough music. Keane’s point regarding this EP is that the songs – recorded on the road – are so diverse that they don’t really make sense as a ‘proper album’, but at the same time they’re good enough to be released. So that is why they’re calling it an EP.

2. It’s an album.

3. The artwork is boring but don’t let this fool you – there’s some exciting stuff on ‘Night Train’. Some of the songs continue in the trajectory of the last Keane album, so ‘Your Love’ (which has touches of ‘Early Winter’) is quite electrical and ‘Stop For A Minute’ (featuring a rap from K’Naan who manages to rhyme ‘females’ with ‘e-mails’ thus putting this song on a level with Pixie Lott’s ‘Cry Me Out’ in that respect and that respect alone) sits well alongside something like ‘Spiralling’.

4. If you fear the modern world don’t worry. ‘My Shadow’ is a proper ‘Bedshaped’-shaped Keane tearjerking piano ballad (a ‘piallad’, if you will). It is a lovely song about there being no need to feel alone because if you shine a light you “will see my shadow on every wall, and you will see my footprint on every floor”, offering the advice that “when your back’s against the wall that’s when you show no fear at all” and *breaks down uncontrollably as result of massive pop blubfest*

5. ‘Ishin Denshin (You’ve Got To Help Yourself)’ sounds like the theme from a long-forgotten early-90s Saturday morning kids TV show FROM SPAIN. Except the guest vocalist, Tigarah (very listenable MySpace tuneage here), is a Japanese Baile Funk expert so that’s a bit confusing. The main point here is that ‘Ishin Denshin (You’ve Got To Help Yourself)’ is on one hand amazing and on the other hand is the sort of thing that should never ever be heard by anybody at all, still less released as a single. It’s not an easy song to come to terms with, but we’ve given it four stars out of five in our iTunes library if that’s any help.

6. ‘Looking Back’ interpolates the Rocky theme (!) and ‘Clear Skies’ has a killer, ‘Call The Shots’-esque chorus, while ‘House Lights’ is the music they came onto on their last tour (hence the name etc).

7. This isn’t connected to the EP ‘per se’ but the Keane Website has a clip of Tom performing the Pet Shop Boys tune ‘Your Funny Uncle’, which is quite nice. *Breaks down uncontrollably for second time*

8. And there we have it. The new Keane ALBUM discussed in some vague waffle which while perhaps not particularly detailed or brilliantly written might lead you to be quite excited about this very good collection of tunes. ‘Stop For A Minute’ is the first single – Keanemusic have a behind the scenes report from the video shoot. The whole thing’s out in May. THERE YOU GO.

WessexScene.co.uk
20th March 2009
Hayley Taulbut

How Keane managed to achieve a sell out show two nights in succession in the massive O2 arena was at first a complete mystery to me.

The first support act, four piece Norwegian band ‘Katzenjammer’ were like Gogol Bordello on steroids: which is fine if you like that kind of thing, but for me, it was like listening to all the discordant sounds in the world put together in a blender and whizzed without the lid on. It was atrocious. Thankfully, second support act ‘Frankmusic’ were much better: at least they had an understanding of harmony and how music actually worked. If their performance was anything to go by, they are likely to be quite big names for 2009.

But on to the main act. Keane exploded onto the stage with ‘The Lovers are losing’, amongst a cacophony of lights and sounds echoing the colour scheme and shapes of their latest album, ‘Perfect Symmetry’. This quickly gave way into hit single ‘Everybody’s Changing’, which Keane gave a facelift through the use of synthesizers, the addition of extra tracks, and through voice delay, which gave the song a feel not dissimilar to that of their latest album. It was at this point I sat up in my seat and paid attention: my low expectations were set to be destroyed over and over again by the three/four piece band from Sussex.

And I was not disappointed – Keane continued to impress me as the show went on. It is unquestionable that lead Tom Chaplin has been blessed with a fantastic voice, and despite struggling with a sore throat, he sung his heart out with an enthusiasm and perfection that belongs in a whole different league than many other leads of bands of as higher calibre as Keane. Other band members matched Tom’s enthusiasm expertly, with Tim playing the piano and keyboard like it would be the last time, and so-called fourth band member, bassist Jess Quin negotiated the stage with the star quality that bands four-times more successful cannot boast of.

For almost two hours, Keane occupied the stage with the air of a band who had been entertaining mass audiences for as long as they can remember, whilst retaining the feeling that they cannot quite believe their luck. Tom Chaplin must have thanked the audience, and told us he was overwhelmed with the show no less than ten times in such a short space of time. Equally as overwhelmed were the die-hard fans who filled the arena with a sound that Tom deemed “the choir of London”. But I daresay, those who were overwhelmed to the greatest degree, were the sceptics such as myself: Even up in the balconies, each audience member, myself included, was out of their seat, dancing singing and clapping along to almost every song.

Keane concluded the show with a four song encore, partially performed on an extended stage amongst the standing crowd, much to their excitement. Anthems ‘Is it any wonder?’ and ‘Bedshaped’ acted as the perfect finale for the perfect gig, with Keane making expert use of the huge screens and the lights to create an experience that the audience would find hard to forget: it was a complete overload of colour, visuals, and sound, yet somehow, what was most memorable was the way that Keane overshadowed all of this with their brilliance and enthusiasm.

So I confess: I am truly a converted citizen: I am now a Keane fan, and proud of it, despite my initial scepticism. And I believe that Keane shall continue ‘spiralling’ into the musical stratosphere for years to come.

Keane live at London’s O2 – 12th Feb (side)“Music for Bedwetters” the legendary Alan McGee christened Keane. The Creation Records founder is usually right about most things, however he seems to have got Keane’s audience completely wrong. At the first of two sold out nights at London’s vast O2 Arena last night, everyone from grannies to teenagers to toddlers were present.

As front man Tom Chaplin commented, their first gigs were in venues smaller than their B-Stage on this tour, and his stage personality has certainly grown with the stages they’ve filled. Playing such big arenas on this tour has seen Tom go from a decent stage presence to a full-blown Bono impression, short of the preaching about the 3rd world.

Opening up the evening, we finally got a chance to catch the hotly tipped Frankmusik. He took over the arena’s stage like it was his own, taking his beatboxing, electro dance tunes a la old style Moby mixed with Calvin Harris to the masses and converting the hoards with the catchy hooks and recognisable samples.

Once the stage was set for Keane, they burst out, triumphantly opening with “Lovers are Losing”, they pleased everyone, playing the classics (Somewhere Only We Know, Everything’s Changing), the current chart hits (Perfect Symmetry, Spiralling) the fan favourite rarities (Sunshine, Snowed Under) and the obligatory new ones. 22 songs in 105 minutes isn’t bad pace for a well seasoned band, let alone some East Sussex kids who were unknown just five years ago.

Starting off the evening slowly, the light display was modest however as things progressed, the national grid was tested to the limits, with Again and Again featuring some computer game graphics on the huge screen behind the band, and A Bad Dream a rather haunting video of war-era dancing in gas masks. The production values were distinctly ramped up, with a B stage inviting a return to their early days, playing to an almost empty room at the Hope and Anchor in north London. Tunes like “Snowed Under” offered a chance to go back to basics.

Coming to the end of the tour, Tom’s voice wasn’t at its best; however this inevitably led to the mass yell-along to “Somewhere Only We Know” towards the end of the evening. Croaky, he took a break to let the crowd do what they do best: “Angels” for the bed-wetting generation, if you will.

Closing out with the usual mass-hug-along of “Bedshapped”, it was sadly time to go home. Whatever you may think of the Battle three piece, they sure know how to put on a good show and have some great pop tunes. Granted, they’re no Arcade Fire or other critics current hype band, but they do what they do best: make great tunes for the mainstream.

Setlist:
Keane: London’s O2 Arena, Thursday 12th February 2009:

Lovers are Losing
Bend and Break
Everybody’s Changing
Better than this
Again and again
A bad dream
This is the last time
Sprialling
Try again
Sunshine
Snowed under
You haven’t told me anything
Leaving so soon
You don’t see me
Perfect symmetry
Somewhere only we know
Crystal ball
–
Playing along
Black burning heart
Is it any wonder
Bedshaped

CURRENTLY at the peak of their creative powers, Keane are back to play Plymouth Pavilions on Monday performing tracks from Perfect Symmetry, an album described as “a million watts brighter and bolder than their previous two.”

It’s a real triumphant return for a band who could so easily have gone their separate ways not so very long ago.

Remember the scenario? Songwriting maestro and keyboard wiz Tim Rice-Oxley recruited angel-voiced lead singer Tom Chaplin for the creation of their lush melodic debut album Hopes and Fears, but with the massive success came inevitable tensions.

As the gregarious frontman, Tom revelled in the adulation, while Tim retreated with embarrassment.

“With the second record we went straight off the road into the studio when we really needed a break,” says drummer Richard Hughes, “and that sowed the seeds for a lot of problems…”

The follow up album, Under The Iron Sea, followed a well-documented psychological battle between the two fuelled by Tom’s cocaine addiction, resulting inevitably in an oppressively dark offering.

Perfect Symmetry finds the three-piece in an altogether more positive mindset – hence the title.

With their differences pretty much behind them, and a real sense of relief that they didn’t actually split, the trio have reinvented themselves yet again, with a little help from US producer Jon Brion (Eighties dance guru and producer of Madonna’s Confessions On A Dancefloor).

“Jon coming on board was a massive influence,” says Tim. “We were in a good place already but he gave us the confidence of not thinking, of not self-editing: not worrying what people are going to think or even what you’re going to think! Let’s face it; the worst that can happen is that the idea doesn’t work.”

And it’s not difficult to hear a distinct Eighties influence coming through:

“The boldness of that time is something that’s really frowned upon today,” says Tim.

“We’re living in a time when it’s cool to be Eighties in a retro way, but if this record sounds like that it’s probably because I associate some of those songs – Pet Shop Boys, Mel and Kim, Salt’N'Pepa – with a fun, innocent time. I absolutely don’t care what’s considered to be fashionable or cool or tasteful; it’s much more about following our own instincts.”

The result is an adventurous explosion of life-affirming energetic pop in which the band have thrown caution to the wind and simply gone with the flow.

In short, it’s a real winner for the lads who initially gained their reputation as one of Britain’s best guitar bands – without even having a guitarist – and are now considered one of the most talented bands anywhere in the world.

It’ll be a real thrill to see them perform tracks from the album live on Monday at their sell-out Pavilions show.

It used to be easy to write off Keane as the winsome and even less hip siblings of Coldplay but times are changing and maybe the drugs did work as, on this evidence, Keane have shredded the earnest-indie blueprint and have set a new course for the Land of Make Believe. Close your eyes and you could be forgiven for believing yourself transported back to a time when Spandau Ballet and ABC ruled the top 40 with sequinned fists. Heck, even with your eyes open the stage set, featuring blocky retro graphics straight from the ZX81, screams 1980s louder than David Van Day in a set of deely-boppers and pink legwarmers.

Closer inspection, however, reveals the fraud, we’ve been hoodwinked for the stage is not populated by New Romantics, those glamorous, angular starlets from a planet yet undiscovered but, rather, by the Eton bob-a-job week scout group. Yes there may well be a touch of glitter on Tom Chaplin but it fails to paper over the cracks of a band that just don’t quite get it. Sure you can rip off Bowie and churn out some old school pop music but if you don’t look the part it is a dereliction of duty. There’s no excuse really, Duran Duran were from Birmingham of all places but by God they had you believing in their hype – of course Le Bon lives on a luxury yacht in the Med, what could be more natural? Nicky Wire wore a feather Boa on the streets of Blackwood, his weekly receipt of a bloody nose a badge of honour awarded for going the extra mile for your art. Must do better Chaplin!

Yet, despite this failure to ultimately convince where it matters Keane have nevertheless succeeded in confounding critics and fans alike with their new direction. They must surely be congratulated for this reinvention as there was evidently plenty of mileage left in the tedious, drab safety of lumpen indie fodder, as Elbow will undoubtedly testify. So, on balance, this must be regarded as a brave move and, therefore, a ‘good thing’ and, based upon this reception, the fans have already taken that the leap of faith; some are even dancing. Dancing to Keane! Was this not one of the harbingers of the Apocalypse? Hell, there’s a lot to be said for providing the public with a bit of fun and I certainly won’t be damning this band for having the balls to take a new direction.

Forget what they teach you in school these days, the 80’s was the zenith of pop music. Sure it was easy to sneer at the Durannies from behind your copy of Sounds (with Andrew Eldritch scowling from the cover) but time has proven that cynicism to be misplaced and the pop of the 80’s is now revered as the golden era. The girls, as ever, knew where it was at and now those ageing boys, having filed away their copies of Mojo, are left standing at the back of a Snow Patrol concert wondering how the hell it ever came to this. Listen to an old man, John Lydon is now advertising butter substitutes on national television; there was a future after all and it was in promoting dairy produce. Go on say something outrageous…What’s that Johnny? Probiotic yoghurt is overrated? What a clever boy. Credibility has been debunked, so ditch the shackles of your oppression and get out and celebrate the new-found joy of Keane before the fading of their light.

It wasn’t just drug addiction that tore Keane apart; the band’s brutal work ethic nearly destroyed them, too. They tell Maddy Costa how they learned to love making music again

Maddy Costa
The Guardian, Tuesday 13 January 2009

Words don’t come easily to Tim Rice-Oxley. The songs he writes for his band, Keane, are earnest meditations on human emotions, modern politics and global violence, and he is quite content to let them speak for him. An introverted interviewee, he will sit for long periods in silence, and much of what he does say (save a few barbed remarks directed at his bandmates) seems wrenched from his soul. So when he says that Keane spent the first half of 2008 experiencing “everything you could dream of as a band”, you don’t dismiss it as hackneyed exaggeration.

The trio spent those months recording their third album, Perfect Symmetry, travelling to studios around the world, experimenting with guitar riffs and Rice-Oxley’s collection of 1980s synthesisers. At night, they “sat up in various bars until four or five in the morning, putting the world to rights – which, for me, is pretty much the ultimate place of happiness”. Then came the realisation that they actually had to put the record out. “By the end of that process, we were really proud of what we’d achieved. But the moment we started worrying about everything that comes with an album – artwork, videos, gigs, interviews – you suddenly realise that you’ve made this thing that is going to be judged. That’s kind of a thrill, but I also felt a weird sadness about it having to become a product. You know that the passion and intricacies that have gone into making the record can’t possibly be things other people can experience.”

Perfect Symmetry wasn’t a unanimous hit among critics, but plenty celebrated its exuberance and spirit of adventure. It shot to No 1 in the UK, and is now well on its way to selling a million copies worldwide. In songs such as Spiralling and The Lovers Are Losing, Rice-Oxley’s lyrics are as emotionally raw as ever, but this time wrapped up in bright, buoyant, 1980s-influenced pop – a significant departure from the sometimes stolid melancholy of the band’s earlier records.

Singer Tom Chaplin thinks these songs have had a marked effect on the band’s live performances: “They’re so fun and energised; they’ve made the live show that much more exciting.” He isn’t being unduly big-headed. I saw Keane play at the Forum in London last September, and it was clear that both band and audience were having the time of their lives.

Keane’s enthusiasm is rooted in an awareness that Perfect Symmetry might never have happened. Two years ago, the band were on the brink of a nervous breakdown. Chaplin had abandoned the band midway through a tour of Japan and checked himself in to the Priory, to combat an addiction to cocaine and alcohol. Rice-Oxley and Hughes, meanwhile, were struggling to cope with the pressures of fame. Keane’s debut album, 2004′s Hopes and Fears, had sold 5m copies, and none of them knew how to deal with such rapid success. “I always imagined that bands would have people around them who knew the drill, knew exactly what was going on,” says Hughes. “But we do everything ourselves. We have had to learn from making mistakes – and we’ve made plenty of mistakes.”

Among these mistakes was a prolonged failure to communicate. Much has been made of Keane’s background: they have been mocked for being polite, middle-class chaps from a village in East Sussex. What gets ignored, though, is the British reserve that goes with this, the politeness that doesn’t want to admit to feelings of unhappiness.

Rather than talk about what were, in fact, shared problems, the three band members stopped speaking to each other while recording their second album, 2006′s Under the Iron Sea. This breakdown in their friendship was all the more traumatic because the trio have known each other since infancy: Hughes thinks he and Rice-Oxley may have met “at some village fete when we were about three”, and Rice-Oxley has known Chaplin since he was born, because their mothers were friends.

Making music has always been integral to their relationship. Chaplin was nine when he first formed a band with Rice-Oxley, and just four when he started recording his own songs. “I’d press the notes on my little Casio keyboard and sing ridiculous things like, ‘I am so cool.’” (“Virtually nothing has changed,” notes Rice-Oxley, drily.) “We weren’t precocious,” says Hughes. “It was more making our own fun. If it was raining, we’d try and find something to do indoors. It was just what we did in the holidays.”

Rice-Oxley says that forming a proper band didn’t become a serious ambition until “our education ran out. You suddenly think, ‘Fuck, what am I going to do with my life?’” He persuaded Chaplin, three years his junior, to abandon a degree in art history at Edinburgh University, and move to London. Because of their upbringing, thinks Chaplin, “people have this notion that Keane were handed everything, but it wasn’t like that. We struggled really hard, not just because it’s difficult anyway but because we’re not particularly natural musicians.” It took four years of knockbacks before the band signed a record deal.

Their tenacity was almost their downfall. Getting signed, says Rice-Oxley, became “an obsession that defines your life. And when you do sign a record deal, that goes up by a factor of 10. You want more and more. None of us would have dared to say, ‘I don’t want to do that tour’, or ‘Can we just have a break?’ We were still in that mindset where we were desperately chasing the thing that we’d been dreaming of for years and years.”

At their nadir, it wasn’t just Chaplin who was in the grip of addiction; the entire band was addicted to achievement. Rice-Oxley believes that “the drugs were almost an outlet, rather than a fundamental problem. As soon as we started to confront the fame and touring-related issues, everything immediately became much easier.”

Chaplin agrees. “A lot of the things people said in the five or six weeks when I was in the Priory I didn’t feel were very appropriate to me. The most important thing was that it was the first time in probably four years where we had to stop, and there was no music, nothing going on. It gave me time to think about the band, and my life, and all the things that had happened to us.”

The failure to take any time off between their first two albums was the band’s other big mistake, and one they won’t be repeating. The day they were supposed to start recording Perfect Symmetry in August 2007, says Hughes, “we ended up sitting out in the sunshine chatting – and realised we wanted to do a bit more of that, and a bit less sitting inside a room playing music”. So they took the next four months off. If Perfect Symmetry shows signs of Keane travelling in unexpected directions and discovering a lightness of spirit, that’s why.

The trio have already started thinking about their fourth album: taking inspiration from Prince and the band’s recent “chaotic”, semi-improvised gigs, Rice-Oxley hopes it will be a more loose-limbed affair than its predecessors. First, though, they have to tour Perfect Symmetry. Their newly relaxed approach means that they’ve been able to start appreciating the thrill of performing live again. Before they got signed, says Rice-Oxley, “every person who turned up to a gig, or bought your single, felt like a victory. During the Hopes and Fears tour, we started to take that for granted a little bit.”

Just as they no longer take their audiences for granted, they no longer take each other for granted. “We’re more carefree,” says Rice-Oxley. “If one of us felt that we had to say, ‘I just don’t want to be in the band any more’, I think we’re more prepared for that now.” And if Keane did come to an end? Chaplin has become intrigued by the Hadron collider and thinks he might study science. Hughes, already a committed human rights campaigner, wants to work for Amnesty International. Rice-Oxley, typically, keeps any future plans to himself. I suspect he wouldn’t be out of the music world for long.

Rating:4/5
Becky Reed

So many bands give press blurbs about radical new directions, but how many follow it through? On third album ‘Perfect Symmetry’, Keane sound like a band putting together their first album – it’s crammed with ideas. There’s none of the polish of the first two, as the majority of the tracks do not feel smoothed over to the point of blandness. However, there was never anything bland about Tom Chaplin’s voice, which drove Keane’s previous work. Here the power of it actually takes a back seat to the playfulness of a band who sound like they’ve been let loose in an Aladdin’s cave of studio equipment. This very eagerness has unleashed a fun side to Keane, but this is not an album merely of “see what we can do” – there’s nothing haphazard or half-hearted about it.

Opener ‘Spiralling’ is the most immediate track, and made even previous Keane dismissers (like this very reviewer) sit up and take notice. Pretending that the inexcusable talking section is not there, ‘Spiralling’ is a vibrant, joyful racket, paying tribute to the best of the Eighties – think ABC. Keane fans of old are eased gently back with ‘The Lovers Are Losing’, which takes the Tim Rice-Oxley formula of huge choruses over melodic grandeur and beefs it up. Here begins a theme recurrent throughout ‘Perfect Symmetry’, one of clawing yourself out of restraints and of re-evaluation. It’s a monster of a song, and inevitably buoyant, thanks to Keane’s sonically heart-stirring effect.

Off to unchartered territory with the Bowie-meets-XTC ‘Better Than This’, Chaplin’s falsetto telling of the emptiness of celebrity aspirations. The sparse electro-pop feel works even better on ‘You Haven’t Told Me Anything’, although you get the impression there’s a beast of a full-on disco version just begging to be made. A track that suffers from its own subtlety – remix, anyone? The piano is back for the title track, which has good intentions, but is trying too hard in its earnestness. Songwriter Rice-Oxley has recently said this to be the song he is most proud of, but it doesn’t hold a candle to the likes of ‘A Bad Dream’.

A return to strengths is the elegant ‘You Don’t See Me’, which grabs you with its haunting, lullaby-like verses. The synths are whipped out for ‘Again & Again’, one of the finest examples of a complete pop song on the album. Definite highlight is ‘Playing Along’, an intense, melancholy track, with Chaplin’s bluesy vocal building up to a dramatic repeated refrain of “I’m gonna turn up the volume ’til I can’t even think”. The guitars (yes, guitars) add to the atmosphere, leaving a long-lasting impression – beautiful, soulful, one of the finest songs Keane have written. In stark contrast, ‘Pretend That You’re Alone’ is a ‘Graceland’-style feel-good energetic romp which is enormous fun, all handclaps, bass guitar (yes, bass) and singalongs.

‘Black Burning Heart’, alas, is standard MOR fayre that is pleasant, but feels unwanted alongside the thrills and spills of what preceded it, and the plodding closer ‘Love Is The End’ is not in fact a fitting finale to an otherwise intriguing LP – it leaves you craving more synths, more guitar, more daftness, more of the spark. When listened to alongside the first two albums, Keane overall have turned out to be pretty far removed from the insulting “middle class” dinner party music tag. In fact, ‘Perfect Symmetry’ makes you completely rethink them as a band – ‘Hopes & Fears’ and ‘Under The Iron Sea’ become both fascinating precursors and non-guilty pleasures as you realise they have so much to offer. Epic stadium ballads, soft rock, indie disco, electro, blues – it all works. Listen without prejudice.