NEW MUSIC: Keane – ‘Cause and Effect’

Keane, one of the world’s most beloved bands, whose four previous albums all entered the British national chart at #1, with cumulative worldwide sales over 13 million, returns with the release of their long-awaited new studio album, CAUSE AND EFFECT, available today via Island Records. North American Tour dates announced for early 2020 on sale now! CBS’s The Late Late Show with James Corden brought the love for their fellow Brits, inviting Keane in June for a live performance of their single “The Way I Feel,” and then again earlier this month to perform “Love Too Much,” both tracks from CAUSE AND EFFECT.

CAUSE AND EFFECT is Keane’s follow-up to Strangeland of 2012, which included the singles “Disconnected” and “Silenced by the Night.”  The birth of the new album came as something of a surprise even to the band.  During their hiatus, singer Tom Chaplin had released two successful solo albums but missed his old sparring partner Tim Rice-Oxley.  “I found myself wondering how I had come to let this very enigmatic and important relationship in my life drift,” Tom said.

Meanwhile Tim, going through his own struggles, found he had written an album’s worth of incredibly personal songs fuelled by humour as well as pain. When Tom, bassist Jesse Quin and drummer Richard Hughes heard the songs, they were immediately drawn to them both sonically and lyrically.  From there, the band found themselves back in the studio doing what they love, bringing these songs to life and reconnecting to each other. “Hopes and Fears was a break-up album too,” Tim said, referring to Keane’s acclaimed 2004 debut, with “Somewhere Only We Know,” a massive hit, covered by Lily Allen, Kacey Musgraves, David Archuleta, and others. “But it was about a break-up when I was 19. It’s a bit different when you’re older and you’ve got kids – your whole little world shifts on its axis.”

“The Way I Feel,” like the other ten tracks on CAUSE AND EFFECT, is an emotional and remarkable slice of life, and reminiscent of the very best of Keane.  It’s an exciting period for one of the UK’s great bands and a very welcome return.  As Tim has said, “We’ve got a lot of great music in us.”  CAUSE AND EFFECT is just that.