Take That: Progress - review

Take That's first album as a quintet since 1995 is informed by two things: a genuinely new sound – shaped by electropop producer Stuart Price – and Robbie Williams's seamless reimmersion into life as a band member, which is played out on emotional duets with Gary Barlow and Mark Owen. Progress takes their sound closer to that of the Killers (the blaring arena-rocker Underground Machine), Scissor Sisters (the glam stomp of Happy Now) and even Supermassive Black Hole-era Muse (the alienated electro marching tune Kidz). The real surprise is that this unexpected step from comfy balladry to something more interesting sounds quite natural – the only element that doesn't fit is the free-floatingly doomy lyrics, which foretell unspecified personal and global calamities. Williams, for instance, groans on Underground Machine: "You're in the room with a rock star/ What a beast, what a man," yet you have to admit, the beast-man and his bandmates have produced a noteworthy modern album.