"I'm alive!" sings vocalist Tim Booth on the opening track of the first James album in seven years. Listening to this comeback effort, there's no sign of the internal turbulence the band went through in the 15 years since their breakthrough album Laid, the album whose lineup is reunited here. And nor is there any sign that the musical landscape has changed, either. Hey Ma is vintage James: the swooping, romantic voice of Booth; the trumpet flourishes, the shimmering guitar patterns, the gently uplifting melodies elevated to anthemic proportions without slipping into cheap bombast. This was recorded tentatively by a band that wasn't convinced it needed to reunite, and done before they signed a record contract. As a result, they've rarely sounded so relaxed, with nothing to prove to themselves or anyone else and focusing on the strengths that made them one of Britpop's finest bands of the early 90s.