Idlewild - Out of Routine

2006 was a long and strange year for Idlewild. Ramping down from 12 months or so that's seen the old acquaintances of bassist, Gavin Fox and former label, Parlophone gone and forgotten, they are once more ready to take up the cup of kindness in preparation for the release of their new album, due next month.

It's been a year that's seen the band grow accustomed to family life and branch off in their own directions. Rod Jones wrote and recorded an album with chanteuse, Inara George. Guitarist Allan Stewart toured relentlessly with his hard rock project, De Salvo and Roddy Woomble wrote, recorded and toured his solo album, the folk-tinged My Secret Is My Silence.

Amongst all the separation and somewhere in between the relentless, self-imposed schedule of the past year, Idlewild found the time to record this next long-player, Make Another World - an album that, as Woomble sits down to talk to The Skinny, he describes as one of Idlewild's most united works. "Not that we need to do other things to feel more together," he says, "We do anything we can to make it exciting, to keep it fresh and interesting, even if it's working with other people and I think that's why we're still around 12 years after we formed."

Taking six months off from the hustle and bustle of the wider world, Idlewild holed themselves up in their Highland practice space and set about creating the next chapter. Recording it themselves, rather than courting labels, it proved both a catharsis and a release from the pressures of the record industry, and as Idlewild lay back, waiting until they were happy with the sounds, Make Another World began to take shape. Seeing Idlewild return to their rock roots, it's an album that has left Woomble sounding unsure as to whether he's retracing old ground or forging new territory, an album that he himself describes as a more organic experience for the band where the songs were written "the way Idlewild started writing them ten years ago."

A New Year and a new dawn, this month sees Idlewild previewing their latest creation at the ABC in Glasgow before a two gig stint at the Royal Concert Hall. To be the band's first performance in the city since Gavin Fox's last appearance with the band at the Barrowlands in December 2005, the shows are a part of Celtic Connections. With three very separate and very different performances, there is a suspicion that Idlewild have ended up doing a bit of everything at the festival. "It's not premeditated, it just happened with the Celtic Connections being in January and Idlewild having a new record out and I was free to play a couple of shows. It's great to get involved." Indeed, this is the first time Idlewild will have ever played at a festival that Woomble has been a vocal supporter of. Insisting, however, that the status of the Celtic Connections as a folk festival won't affect Idlewild's performance, Roddy takes a step back from what has, all the way through, been a serious blether and laughs, "Idlewild is Idlewild. We're not going to be breaking out accordions or bagpipes. We are still a rock band, and that is what shows through in Make Another World."

In the face of this claim Idlewild have, however, already broken out the accordions for a series of acoustic shows in recent years, although maybe not the bagpipes, just yet. Despite their return to rock, Woomble is also quick to enforce just how strong the folk influence on Idlewild has been. "It's still my favourite kind of music," he says, coyly, "and next year, I'm planning on working on some more songs with John McCusker, but it might not be another Roddy Woomble solo album. It might turn into something else."

Speaking of both the splits of Gavin and Parlophone, Woomble is ever the optimist, at least these days, and is just content to go with the flow - "Something had to change. We'd spent nine years in a cycle and we knew that it had come to an end." Something did change, but it still takes an impressive unit to put a positive spin on splitting from two long-term partners. Idlewild, it seems, is finally that sort of band - one that is content within itself, a band that has embraced its new found freedom and content enough to go with the flow. Happy to follow an as yet unbeaten path, Woomble concludes, "it's not like we sat around a table and discussed what we wanted Make Another World to sound like. We just allowed things to take their natural course." At last, Idlewild have finally let it happen and have finally put together an album, rather than a collection of songs.