The Proclaimers, Angry Cyclist (Cooking Vinyl) ***

IF you can trust one band to put a spoke in the wheel, it would be Scottish twins The Proclaimers on their 11th album in 31 years of Charlie and Craig Reiding the riot act while still chasing romantic ideals.

Angry Cyclist is the album title, but the title track is a lament to wider matters than irate bike riders, instead addressing bigotry and rage at large with passion. The bothered brothers may have been around for three decades, but there is a no-time-to-lose urgency emanating from these 13 surging, hearty and meaty songs, eight of them over and done with in under three minutes in punk's furious tradition, as the Leith siblings become aerated with righteous socialism over the class system, the far right, British imperialism, and ignorance at large on such outbursts as Looted and Classy.

Punk in spirit, as well as bravura brevity, Charlie and Craig still favour a snappy, soulful, country-folk template, here upgraded with strings, as producer David Eringa echoes his rally-call work with Manic Street Preachers and Idlewild.

A sense of passing years pervades Angry Cyclist too – the twins are 56 – as they contemplate a shortening, uncertain future and lost youth in Then It Comes To Me and advocate frankness and a desire for a better world before it's too late in Sometimes It's The Fools.

Earlier this year, in May, West Yorkshire Playhouse mounted a five-star production of The Proclaimers' musical, Sunshine On Leith, and should future productions look to add new songs, two leap out from Angry Cyclist. Streets Of Edinburgh is a paean to their home city as beautiful as Sunshine On Leith itself and You Make Me Happy is an instant singalong.

Wit and grit, satire and ire are constant bedfellows in The Proclaimers' lyrics, typically so in The Battle Of The Booze, which brings crystal clarity to the ups and downs of vodka. Harmonising against a far from harmonious world, the Reids finish with the waltzing I'd Ask The Questions. They don't always have the answer, but they make you laugh, they make you sigh, they make you angry.

The Proclaimers play York Barbican on October 17 and Hull City Hall on October 20.

Charles Hutchinson