SKUNK ANANSIE Recording New Album

Drummer Mark Richardson of the reunited '90s British rockers SKUNK ANANSIE has issued the following update:

"In January of 2010 we (the freshly reformed SKUNK ANANSIE) got together to start writing a new record after almost 10 years in the wilderness. Hoorah!

"After six weeks of a daily commute to Hackney from Guildford (which involved car to the station, train to Waterloo, two tube lines, a bus and a five-minute walk) we had come the end of the writing process and whittled 80 ideas down to 25 songs.

"I love the process of song writing in SKUNK. We all bring ideas to the table and can fling them in no matter what they are, melodies, lyrics, drums and bass and guitar lines are all up for debate.

"You'd think it would take an age to get anything done being so democratic but not when everybody is of the same mind, i.e. if it's a great idea it'll get in.

"You can't be shy about putting ides forward or hurt if they don't get used but it's the best way to really maximise the best of everybody's talent and it really really works. As you'll hear on the record.

"From there we had to get really ruthless with ourselves, put any personal attachment to any songs to one side and just choose the best darn songs. 25 became 15 became 14 as we were to lose one later on, too.

"No room for any fillers on this record. We can't afford it.

"10 years away is a massive amount of time in a business which has accelerated rate of disposability, and we have a lot of catching up to do.

"As I write we are in week 3 day 3 of a seven-week recording process with Chris Sheldon at the helm for 10 of the tracks and then Jeremy Wheatley for the remaining four. I have finished all my drum tracks with Chris and have started on some of the programming aspects that will go underneath some of the songs to really make them lift, chug, wallop and propel them along.

"After our 'Smashes and Trashes' greatest-hits tour comes to an end in September, the record will be out and we'll be straight back on the road to do a huge European tour in support of it.

"I hope you love listening to it as much as I loved recording it.

"This is a really different record for us and I'm already extremely proud of what we've achieved just in terms of the songs. It's really shaping up to be something special, but then I would say that."

Check out photos from the studio at this location.

SKUNK ANANSIE's "Because Of You" video can be viewed below.

"Because Of You" was the first single to be made available from the band's greatest-hits album, "Smashes And Trashes", which came out on November 2, 2009.

"Smashes and Trashes" is a 15-track career-embracing album. It features classic moments from SKUNK ANANSIE's three LPs — "Paranoid & Sunburnt" (1995),"Stoosh" (1996) and "Post Orgasmic Chill" (1999) — and includes three brand new tracks: "Because Of You", "Tear The Place Up" and "Squander".

SKUNK ANANSIE — vocalist Skin (Deborah Dyer),bassist Cass (Richard Lewis),guitarist Ace (Martin Kent) and drummer Mark Richardson — split up in 2001 but announced in September 2008 that they were writing new material together.