It has been four years since Courteeners released their last album ‘More. Again. Forever.’ Coming out just before the world shut down leaving many like me locked inside listening to music all day every day.

The album was a more mature Courteeners as opposed to their “lad-ish” nature that many fans had come to know them by. And Pink Cactus Café is no different to this

From the singles released, fans would be instantaneously surprised if they hadn’t listened to the band’s newer endeavours and were expecting another ‘St Jude’.

The first single from Pink Cactus Café, was released in early July, in the height of the British Summer time, and to me, this is frontman Liam Fray’s attempt at a summer hit, it’s filled with a poppy upbeat synth like guitar, and a catchy whistle joining the chorus together, that at first wasn’t my sort of thing, expecting another rocky ‘St Jude’ like album, rammed with an indie guitar tone, but after catching it on the radio in the car,  I couldn’t help but bob my head and whistle along with the song.

Pink Cactus Café is an album ram full of collaborations and features, from the likes of Australian band ‘DMA’s’, Liverpudlian guitarist/singer songwriter ‘Pixey’.

The first song album is one of these that has a collaboration on it, and this time it is Brooke Combe. Sweet Surrender is another song on this album that just sticks in your head and makes you relax, filled with some punchy guitar tone surrounding the anthemic vocals with some delightful backing vocals from Combe.

The titular track is a reminiscent and nostalgic tune that again is incredibly relaxing and transports the listener to another place, a place that is filled with fond memories of friends and family, and good times of the past. This is a song that shows Fray’s maturity, where he is still the same person who wrote such era defining tracks like ‘Not Nineteen Forever’ with a bit of a softer and more reminiscing tone to his music.

Possibly my favourite song on this collection is, ‘First Name Terms’ this song features Pixey, whose debut album ‘Million Dollar Baby’ went to number three on the Independent Album Charts, delivers some amazing vocals on a powerful ballad about the social issues in today’s Britain.

Although it may have been 16 years since Courteeners released their first album, Pink Cactus Café still makes fans reminisce on those days of that album, with vocals that are still Manc-infused, some punchy and heavy guitar tones, but more mature and heartfelt lyrics of a man who tells stories of relationships, today’s society but most importantly the story of how far the band have come since being a group of 20-something year olds, to still being friends pushing their 40’s.

Courteeners: Pink Cactus Café – Out 25 October 2024 (Ignition Records)

– Pink Cactus Café (Official Video)