From their beginnings in early ‘90s Nottingham, rock band Tindersticks have carved a niche of their with their lush orchestrations and sophisticated songwriting, winning a devoted fanbase along the way. With

The Hungry Saw – their sixth studio album and their first in five years – about to drop, keyboard player David Boulter spoke to Three’s A Crowd about the last half-decade in the life of the band.

Three's A Crowd - We’ve not heard much from you since 2003’s Waiting For The Moon. What have those five years been like?

David Boulter - We’ve still been busy, even though Tindersticks kind of stopped for a while. Stuart [Staples, singer] made two solo albums, which I was involved in, and we both made a children’s-themed record called Songs For The Young At Heart. So quite a lot of things were happening, even though it all went quiet on the Tindersticks front.

TAC - Does it feel good to be back working under the name?

DB - Yeah, it feels good to make a new record and to feel excited about it. That was a big problem that we had five years ago, that we’d lost the sense of excitement that we had between the six people in the band and it took a while for us to decide what to do about that. I suppose when you’re making music five years for one album is a long time, but at the same time, when you’re writing the songs it’s like time just flies by anyway.

TAC - Stuart’s living in France now, which is where you recorded the album. How did you find the change?

DB - It was really different but really good as well, because of all the space. I think the main reason for Stuart moving there was that he needed space to live. It’s an old farm and there’s a big barn that we converted into a studio. So that gave us a lot of room and it felt really comfortable to record in there. It’s very isolated in some ways, so you can concentrate on what you’re doing.