JAMES : PLEASED TO MEET YOU - WHAT ENO SAYS

Brian Eno described the album to the NME  as "the best they've made" and added the following regarding the recording process : "They're all complete takes, there's very few repairs done, hardly any overdubs. The whole idea was to try to make an album in what is actually a rather old-fashioned way: start with the songs written and properly structured, play them live and record them. It's very regressive in a way, saying, 'Let's go back to making a record that records a band at its peak.'"

"They're like a band reborn somehow," said Eno. "It's like when people make their first album they're full of enthusiasm and excitement and they know what they're doing and it's a pleasure. This was like making a first album. I think it's the best record they've made. The standard is so high on every song. There's nothing where you think it could've been better. We've got too many good songs, more good songs than we can put on the record."

Further to that, he spoke to Mojo in April 2001 - "On the new James record, we decided to try something which nobody's done for many years - which is, write all the songs, rehearse them, get the structures right, then play them live in front of people, and only then record them. When did you last hear of a band doing that, other than on their first album? I chose a brilliant old-school engineer, Gary Langan, who's fabulous. The result was that we got a recording where you can just sit at the desk and push the faders up in a straight line, and it sounds fucking great!

I suppose that's the reason why we had all those new songs being played live on the last tour. The reasons bands generally don't do it is because of bootlegging. Pink Floyd did that before Dark Side of the Moon, and it was bootlegged to the last."