VINTAGE rockers led by Newport punk legend Jon Langford have released their third album for County Mile Records, and it is their best to date – by a country mile!

The band locked themselves away in a rural mid-Wales studio with producer and engineer Richard Jackson who recorded every track live with minimal overdubs. The result is an exceptional collection of 12 tracks inspired by local stories and individuals from their hometown of Newport.

The album showcases the fine song-writing talents and vocals of Langford, Julian Hayman and Matt Gray as they explore their hometown history and the spooky Welsh hinterlands.

The cover art by Jon Langford returns the infamous Newport cherub - the city’s emblem on the old bridge - from Manchester back to the city after The Stone Roses borrowed it for the cover of their Love Spreads single in 1994.

The album kicks off with a blast of grungy guitar chords on Commercial Street, a rollicking opener about homelessness and retail decay in Newport city’s centre. Jon is at his caustic best here spitting out gritty lyrics of anger and despair.

Ruby, an up-tempo dance tune sung by Matt Gray, is a wartime tale about the legendary Ruby Loftus who worked a lathe in the Royal Ordnance Factor in Newport and danced the weekends away with American soldiers. It has also been released as a double ‘A’ side single with Tenby Boatman, a lilting Welsh bossa nova about local lads rowing the gentry across Tenby Bay.

Mrs Hammer’s Dream is Julian Hayman’s tragic tale of five-year-old Tommy Jones who went missing in 1900 and whose body was found on Pen Y Fan, the highest point in the Brecon Beacons. Full of compassion and pathos, it is sung beautifully .

Bolstered by a rousing anthemic chorus, Encounter with a Selkie off Llangranog is Jon’s slice of Welsh magic realism about meeting the mythical creature that resembles a seal in the water but assumes human form on land.

More strange things happen in a local forest where spells are cast under the canopy of the trees in Lost in the Wentwood sung by Hayman, whose excellent vocals reminded me of Peter Gabriel.

The band are launching the album with a matinee show at Le Pub in Newport on Saturday, November 11. The show starts at 2pm after which the band have a Q&A session with local history expert Richard Frame.

The album is released on CD, download and streaming from the usual digital stores and will be available on vinyl in the new year. For further information e-mail orders@countrymile.org. Country Mile Records, tel: 07742 278340.