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Are you going for the huge, all-conquering rock sound on Liberation Transmission?

Jamie Oliver: We're writing for interplanetary success! We just thought it'd be a laugh to have a crack. We did the crazy, scatty 'here's some hardcore, here's some jazz' thing on the first album. On the second record we tried to write 'songs' and for this is one we're developing again. Maybe on the next record we'll start with monkey noises!

I think it's harder to write big rock songs; it's a challenge. We pretty much asked how do you do that? How do we do the best songs that we can do? How can we do a song that is so timeless, isn't any specific genre, and isn't in a fashion that's going to come in and out? How do you do songs that are going to stick in people's heads? That's pretty much the challenge that we set out to tackle.

Stuart Richardson: Were we? I was just having a laugh! I was just writing big riffs and going for the big rock sound! Is this good or bad? Good, right, next! We were conscious about trying to write better songs than last time. We definitely weren't doing anything to cut off our noses, but not contrived either.

Was there a freedom with having a successful second album that you could take your time doing it?

SR: I'd say this album took as long as the second one, maybe less. We lost our drummer, and that set us back a couple of months.

JO: We wanted to get it done quicker than it actually took in the end. It happened to be roughly the same length of time as the last one. We kind of resigned ourselves to the fact that this is how long it takes us.

SR: From the inception to when the album hits the shelf is a year.

JO: There's a lot of reasons for that - having the songs, writing the variety of songs, living with the songs for long enough and having the freedom to change them if and when you feel they needs it. I dread to think what would happen if we went in and wrote for a month and then that was going to be the album!

Some of the ideas were there from being on the road for Start Something, but usually we wipe the slate clean though. It's always a worry that if you start writing songs on the road a year ago that when you record the song and it comes out, two and a half years have passed.

SR: Rooftops was written on the road, and so was Everybody's Screaming!!!