The Charlatans UK

“The moral of the story is ‘You can never have too much too late’,” Tim Burgess sings on “Wake Up”, one of the many soul-saving songs on Wonderland, the new full-length album from The Charlatans UK. The sentiment fits, for the Charlatans have taken the wisdom of experience to make Wonderland-the seventh album of their twelve-year career-a platter piled high with the good stuff.

The honky-tonk throwdown of first single “Love Is The Key” is a veritable definition of irresistibility. With the band’s trademark organ-swirling rock reinvigorated by absinthe and a great Big Mushroom (more on those below!), their huge tunes continue to uplift listeners’ spirits and inspire fancy dancefloor footwork. In short, Wonderland is the most inspired and inspirational album of the Charlatans career, and a bold bid to crack open American heads and hearts.

The Charlatans experienced so much so soon-their 1990 debut album Some Friendly topped the UK charts on the crest of their anthem “The Only One I Know”-that conventional guesswork predicted the band would be out of the game by the time the heady rush of the dance-rock Madchester movement subsided. Yet the group-Tim Burgess (vocals), Martin Blunt (bass), Mark Collins (guitar), John Brookes (drums), Tony Rogers (keyboards)-has repeatedly defied expectation to grow into an essential lasting pleasure in the past decade-plus of popular music.

Gonzo from the get-go, Wonderland kicks off with the reinforced-beats of “You’re So Pretty-We’re So Pretty.” Mark Collins’ snarling guitar and the voodoo throb of Martin Blunt’s bass mount a toothsome attack as Tim Burgess chants the lines “show me the silver/show me the gold/show me the money”-perhaps a kiss-off to materialism, or perhaps a demand for the enduring value of the Charlatans to be repaid in hard terms. This duality-is Burgess being sincere or sardonic?-carries into the chorus that gives the tune its title. “‘Pretty’ is one of those words that’s alright to say in America,” Tim says, “but when British men hear it, they’ll be concerned, like being called ‘pretty’ is a threat to their machismo. But singing ‘We’re so pretty’ afterwards is reminiscent of the Sex Pistols “Pretty Vacant.” So the punk connotation of being hard makes it okay again,” Tim says wryly.

Over the skittering, electronic pulse of “And If I Fall” Burgess sings the lines “I want to touch somebody for real/ I want to take away their bad things/ I want to change the world/ just for the hell of it/ just for the sake of it/ just ’cause I need it/ just ’cause I want you.” This could be called the album’s thesis, for it’s Burgess’ uninhibited exploration of emotional vulnerability that is the key theme of Wonderland.

“Tim’s no longer afraid to wear his heart on his sleeve,” says guitarist Collins. Burgess himself sees the new album’s lyrics are borne of a need “to address the insecurities that all men have to fight every day.” Part of the strength to do so comes from Burgess finding the life partner he’s always sought, his wife Michelle. Wonderland, then, is thematically akin to Bob Dylan’s oft-overlooked 1970 LP New Morning, when a happily married Dylan eschewed cryptic poetics in favor of unfettered emotional expression.

Burgess’ new openness inspired the singer to find a new voice with which to express it. The great Philly soul singer Ronnie Walker once said, “I never really thought about my falsetto-I always just looked at the high notes as where I had to go.” Similar intuition led Burgess to the upper register of his own voice, a place where the delicate sentiments of “A Man Needs To Be Told” (the first song the band wrote for Wonderland) acquire a wistful grace. “I felt the high notes would give the record more depth,” Burgess says, “by creating space above Martin’s low-end monster bass grooves.” At a time when most British rock music vocalists sound stricken with a soupy strain of the flu, Burgess’s progress as a vocalist is all the more gratifying.

The artistic growth of Burgess hasn’t happened in a vacuum. The music on Wonderland is testament to the ever-more-colorful rainbow bridge of understanding that exists between singer and band. Meanwhile, producer Danny Saber, known for his hit-making with Marilyn Manson and Black Grape, has honed the group’s sound to a penetrating sharpness. “Judas”, with its dead-aim sonic assault, sounds like Saber got the band to plug their instruments into launch pads at Jet Propulsion Labs.

The rock essence of the Charlatans has always been gilded with a knack for integrating the rhythms of dance music. Never have the fruits of the band’s love of dancefloor culture (witness Burgess’ recent stints DJing on LA’s club scene, and his numerous collaborations with friends the Chemical Brothers) been deployed so potently. Towards the end of the countrified shuffle “A Man Needs To Be Told” (with pedal steel guitar played by Grammy-winning U2 producer Daniel Lanois), the wings of a heavenly choir spread wide as John Brookes’ drumming accelerates seamlessly into a drum’n’bass breakdown. It’s this thrilling ability to create slipstreams between seemingly incompatible styles of music that makes Wonderland such a treasure.

In the hefty tome of Charlatans hardships, the harshest chapter was the death of founding member and keyboardist Rob Collins partway through the recording of 1997’s Tellin’ Stories. “We are rock,” Tim Burgess declared shortly afterward. The statement reflected both the Charlatans unbreakable unity of purpose and their unwavering rock’n’roll spirit. With keyboardist Tony Rogers’ now fully integrated into the group matrix, it’s fitting that the stunning requiem “I Just Can’t Get Over Losing You” builds from Rogers’ chilling Hammond organ intro.

Burgess now lives full-time in Los Angeles while the rest of the group continues to reside in England. This situation turned Wonderland’s recording process into an intercontinental affair. (When asked what effect the singer’s relative absence has had on the group, Mark Collins quips, “Absinthe definitely makes the heart grow fonder!”) Most of the original tracks were laid down at the band’s own Big Mushroom studios in rural England, before recording was transferred to LA, and then back to Big Mushroom’s scruffy magic for a final mix. The title Wonderland itself represents both locations, being a nod to Michael Winterbottom’s gritty British drama Wonderland (a film the band watched while recording) and to Wonderland Avenue, the street in Los Angeles that the group drove down every day on their way to the studio. “The music was our wonderland as well,” says Mark Collins. “It was a title nobody argued about.”

Destined to give the Charlatans the fourth #1 UK album of their career, the band has equally high hopes for Wonderland in the US. “One of the ambitions I had when I started,” says Mark Collins, “is to have a number one record in Britain and America at the same time. I still have that goal, and as long as we’re producing good music, we have a chance of achieving it.” As Tim Burgess puts it, “Bands that don’t care about being successful in America, that’s their loss. Our music is universal. Everyone has a chance to get it.” Or as Curtis Mayfield once sang, you don’t need a ticket, just get on board. Away we go, then, to Wonderland.