Their twenty-eighth studio album finds Status Quo with tongues firmly placed in cheek. The title itself is a wry nod to the critics and the cover a wonderful ‘Raiders Of The Lost Ark’ style spoof. Exploiting the idea to the maximum there was also a Treasure Hunt style tie-in with a UK tabloid to co-incide with the albums release that offered a variety of goodies to be won.

With so many Quo songs imbedded in the memory banks from years gone by it is all too easy to dismiss the later material as being simply not good enough. And it is fair to say the covers albums of the later 90’s did them few favours. But there are enough decent tunes to be found on ISOTFC that prove Rossi, Parfitt and their co-writers can still come up with the goods when they need to. Opening track ‘Beginning Of The End’ may have failed to dent the Top 40 but it is still a catchy number that highlights the trademark Quo shuffle and was the obvious first single. Parfitt takes the lead vocal on the driving rocker ‘Alright’ and despite my misgivings about his voice on stage he sounds pretty good here.

Elsewhere, the boogie-filled ‘I Don‘t Wanna Hurt You Anymore‘ sounds as if it has been lifted straight from one of their late 70‘s albums whilst ‘Electric Arena’ is a slow blues number that varies the tempo and comes with a Gary Moore-esque solo. It is worth noting that ISOTFC finds the band reunited with producer Pip Williams and it seems to have done the trick. Bassist of the last 20-odd years Rhino Edwards also gets his first lead vocal on ‘Bad News’ and does enough to suggest he has been hiding his light under a bushel all of this time. This is definitely one new song that should make the live set.

It’s not a complete thumbs up; ‘Tongue Tied’ is a limp ballad that is a distant cousin to ‘Living On An Island’ but nowhere near as good and there are a couple of other songs that could be firmly labelled as filler, notably ‘Hold Me’ and ‘Saddling Up’. But for the most part Quo have come up with an album that has plenty of variety and at least four chords.

Out now on Edsel Records.