FRANZ Ferdinand conquered the charts with music you could dance to, but Scotland on Sunday can reveal their hotly anticipated follow-up draws heavily on the influence of song-writing legend Bob Dylan.
Lead singer Alex Kapranos says the band have been far more ambitious with the lyrics on the new album, writing ballads packed with real characters from their daily lives.
Kapranos says the award-winning group has listened extensively to Dylan ove
r the past six months, seeking inspiration and new challenges from the "musical ideals" of the period.
He added that the band had turned down the chance to perform at T in the Park this summer because they wanted to be in the studio, progressing musically rather than suffering the "slow death of predictability".
The switch of emphasis from trendy contemporary guitar rock to the lyric-dominated ethos of four decades ago might seem a risky strategy for a band that has scooped top awards and sold millions of records.
But industry experts believe Franz Ferdinand are shrewdly repositioning themselves in a crowded marketplace, with the aim of maintaining their place at the top and, in particular, boosting sales in the US.
Their Mercury Prize-winning first album, Franz Ferdinand, has so far sold 3.2 million copies around the world, one million of them in America.
Speaking from New York, where the band are mixing the new album, Kapranos said: "I have been listening to Dylan a lot recently. I like the period when he was playing with The Band.
"I think maybe it is the musical ideals of that period that are inspiring us, particularly his approach to lyric writing. I think I have been really, really searching for new challenges, and with regard to lyric writing there is so much more that can be done.
"We have taken an almost ballad-writing approach to personalities and characters in songs. It was something Bob Dylan was talking about in his Chronicles book."
The first Franz Ferdinand album was not noted for its Dylanesque lyrical genius, with offerings like: "I'm on BBC2 now/Telling Terry Wogan how I made it" and "It's always better on holiday/So much better on holiday/That's why we only work when/We need the money".
Kapranos agrees that if they are to retain their popularity and build on the success of the first album they have to develop musically. "We have tried to be a bit more ambitious and certainly, lyrically, we have tried to widen the approach and expand on the ideas I had before.
"There is quite a contrast with the first album. We have tried to catch more of the extremes; there are moments of optimism and other moments which are maybe slightly darker, more melancholy, more bittersweet."
On their T in the Park no-show, Kapranos said: "There seems to be a climate of the progression of bands where they record their records, plug them for two years and do not even consider going back into the studio.
"We wanted to do the opposite of that. It would have been great to do T in the Park this year. It was one of the most exciting moments of my life, but if we played T in the Park and did all those other festivals, we would not be in the studio recording another record. We wouldn't be progressing as musicians.
"We wanted to stay exciting and still have that edge to a performance because you know the music is novel. If you slip into predictability it is the death of your band."
The band has been recording in their studio near Glasgow since the start of the year. Working with producer Rich Costey, Kapranos says they have recorded 16 songs, of which probably 11 will go on the final album.
They will now play a couple of gigs in America before finishing the album, which will be released in September. At this stage there are no plans for the launch, but Kapranos says there are plans for a "one-off" event in Scotland.
Earlier this month they played three concerts in Russia and previewed some new tracks: 'This Boy', 'Your Diary', 'Wee Andy' and 'Evil Heathen'.
Scotland on Sunday music critic Colin Somerville said: "Kapranos is a very smart, astute musician. He will know that in this day and age the band will have to evolve far quicker. There is not a lot of room for development. Unless you are Oasis, you are not going to get a 10-year career, so he is probably looking to evolve Franz Ferdinand beyond merely an extremely eloquent, structured band to something a bit looser.
"Their first album was very well received but Kapranos has been at it long enough to know you have to move on pretty sharply and perhaps consolidate their position in America with a more folksy sound."
