The streamlined three-piece Foals were ready to shake things up and mess with the formula that made them one of the biggest bands in Britain since they emerged in 2008. To do that, they knew that they would each have to step up and tap into everything that makes the band so special. The result is ‘Life Is Yours’. A euphoric life-affirming record that captures the desire of a culture and society desperate for something to celebrate and a little bit of carefree abandon after two years of miserable gloom. “The absolute last thing we wanted to do was write a languished miserable lockdown album,” laughs drummer Jack Bevan. So here we are in 2022, and it’s time to party.

The vibe and the impetus to keep things upbeat and energised are at the album’s heart. Notably, there are none of the massive riff-laden behemoths that powered their previous albums in a sign that this is a reconfigured version of the band. “I specifically said I didn’t want to write any heavy rock songs, not ever again but not right now,” explains Yannis. “We’d been in that place for a minute, and it was time to shift things up. There was very little distortion or fuzz to get away from that heavy expansive aspect of our sound that we’d previously been exploring. I got the other part of our DNA and re-emphasised that for a bit. What’s kept the band exciting for us and hopefully other people over the years is that we’ve played with that stuff, and we’ve not just stuck to one lane of sound. It was time to do that again.”

The DNA that he’s referencing is the intensely rhythmic and dance-focused side of the band that has always been part of their sonic arsenal. Perhaps their biggest ever hit, ‘My Number’ was a dancefloor-slaying monster. The tracks collected on ‘Life Is Yours’ are very much in that image; they represent the spirit of the band going right back to the start. “After the last records, because there was such a broad spectrum of stuff going on there both sonically and thematically, we wanted to just pair everything right down and make something concise and focused and direct,” says Yannis. “We wanted it to be cohesive and have one mood across the record. That’s what [debut album] ‘Antidotes’ had. In a way, it’s the long lost brother or sister of that record. It’s also got that directness and dryness. The rhythmic emphasis is most apparent in those two records. They are driven by the groove and the rhythm section.”

It wasn’t necessarily explicitly spoken about, but there was a feeling throughout making the album that the band were tapping into the guiding principles that informed the bedrock of their spirit as they looked to navigate the future without two key members. “We’re relearning the dynamic as a three-piece,” explains Jack. “It felt a bit like going back to the drawing board with this record. We were thinking about what we started off with and what were our original influences but now approaching it with more experience. It was a similar mindset to making ‘Antidotes’ but with an extra 13 years of experience.”

The ecstatic exuberance of ‘Life Is Yours’ provoked other memories of that early golden period as, forced into a tiny room with just the three of them, the band whipped up a rhythmic storm as if their lives depended on it. “That spirit is hewn into our DNA,” says Jimmy. “That party vibe is how we started.”

“The way we wrote the record in this tiny room felt like when we were playing those house parties in 2006,” adds Jack. “We were tapping into that energy. We were also quite militant in that when we were writing Yannis wasn’t using any effects on the guitar. I stripped my kit right back to a minimal set-up. It was quite a tight, dry sound. It felt like we got to a place where we rehearsed enough that it was really tight, so we didn’t want to slather effects all over it and make it woozy. It’s got the leanness of the first record.”

This is an excerpt taken from the March 2022 edition of Dork, out now. To read the full interview, order a copy of the magazine below, or join the Dork Supporters scheme, and read it in full online now.