As a final testament about the new Grinspoon album, Phil Jamieson, the band’s frontman, says in a very, very sarcastic voice: “This album’s way better than the last one and you know what? We’ve discovered ourselves.” But that sarcasm fades when he says “it’s the same kind of shit all over again…Who cares? It’s gonna be a great record!”

So unless you’ve been on Mars for the past ten years or longer, you’ll know what to expect from the upcoming Grinspoon release. An album that continues the insane carnival ride of loud songbursts tucked next to angsty ballads that are sophisticated enough to remain thought provoking no matter how much the commercial radio stations play them.

For just over two years, Grinspoon have been relatively quiet. And when Jamieson’s side project *The Lost Gospel *brought their debut album out earlier this year, most people would have thought it would be a lot longer until another Grinspoon album graced the record stores and radio speakers. ”[Being in The Lost Gospel] was really hard,” Jamieson says. “I have a lot more respect for what we have in this band.” And it’s obvious, after reading the tour diary tales of perpetual disasters from lack of towels to stolen guitars, that returning to do a record and tour with an already successful band seems like a great way to start the next year as a muso.

While Grinspoon had indeed parted ways for the best part of 2006, the songs kept bubbling out of all the band members’ heads.”We wrote about 50 songs and we picked about 20 of the best,” he says. “And then we wielded it down to 15, all of pure quality. I can’t see any of them not making the record. I like all of them for 15 individual reasons.”

The album will be finished in January and hopefully hits shelves in February. It’s completely self produced by the band and it can be supposed that while this will have all the ingredients of the past Grinspoon albums, the tracks which made it on the new album are going to be a more blatant way for the band to prove the rawness of their sound and their ability to continue to produce great tunes.

“We took our last producer [Howard Benson] 25 songs and he picked 11 of them – some of them were great; I like the record; don’t get me wrong but some of them just didn’t fit us, it felt like a bit of an uncomfortable cloak,” explains Jamison. “We’re taking control.”

So now that the band have total control about what goes onto the record, what are the songs gonna be about? “There are songs about me murdering someone with a shattered mirror, there are also some more fragile ballads songs about grief and loss and songs about partying and Wolfmother and Tsubi,” Jamieson explains. “It’s pretty cheeky as well. I’m having fun but I’m not worried about other stuff.”

If an album title hasn’t been thought of yet, then there is no way a tour has in any way been imagined. But there definitely will be one. “At the moment we’re just focused on making the record itself,” he says.

The bottom line of the self-produced album is that the band are going to make this album more raw and more ‘them’ than ever before: if you’re into Grinspoon you’ll be into the new album.”This record is a bit more angry personally and lyrically I have a bit of a fire in my belly about stuff,” Jamieson says. “So that makes it more exiting.”

Watch out for Grinspoon’s new album in 2007.