Producing the goods

The Charlatans: "Tellin' Stories" (Beggars Banquet) Dial-a-track code: 1201

If only everything in life were as dependable as The Charlatans. In the five albums since their breakthrough in 1989, their stylistic advances have been about as extensive as British advances at the Somme. That Tellin' Stories, therefore, should combine their trademark lolloping base-lines with Keef Richards-style guitars in 11 great songs is no surprise; that it should do so without their supremely talented pianist Rob Collins, tragically killed in a road accident last year, is.

This is an album that the retro dullards so prominent in the world of pop today should study. For while their sound is unashamedly 1960s, from the Dylanesque rant of How High to the Stones copy You're A Big Girl Now, they are incapable of producing anything cliched or crass. Their genesis in the groovy Manchester scene of the late 1980s also gives them a spirit and verve unrivalled by the dadrockers that have followed them. It would he a strangely insensitive person who didn't tap his feet to the majestic With No Shoes, or the thunderclap that is One To Another. And that's The Charlatans' strength. They're not geniuses; they just produce strutting, good-time pop that works on a recklessly primitive level.

It may seem strange praising a band for doing the same old thing, but having seen The Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses fritter their potential, it is great indeed to see someone produce the goods as consistently and thrillingly as The Charlatans do.