IT’S been a long time coming, but now fans of the Yards can now breathe easily as the York band releases its long-awaited second album at The Duchess tomorrow night.

Imperial Measures started life in the Lake District on New Year’s Day, 2007, in what would prove to be a productive, if stressful experience, as singer Chris Helme recalls.

“We decided to engineer and produce the album ourselves, which is great as we wanted the whole thing to be homemade and we knew what we wanted to do. But I definitely started to lose my mind doing it… in a good way, though.

“We wanted the whole thing to be as live as possible with loads of atmosphere. So we stole pretty much every old recording trick in the book, borrowed a load of vintage mics from Alan Leach and took over this cottage for a couple of weeks.”

The reason for the delay between recording and releasing, says Chris, is that life got in the way, with weddings, births, job changes and a PHD coming to fruition.

Keyboard and strings maestro John Hargreaves believes the gap gave the album a new impetuous. “The time just seemed to be right, and listening to the tunes again, the spark was reignited,” he says.

The album is in many ways the perfect follow up to the eponymous debut, but, says John, it makes the band’s identity more concrete.

“There are plenty of key Yards references, but now it’s more of an assimilation of styles, a more integrated sound, and sounds more like what we think the Yards sound is.”

Imperial Measures was named for a number of reasons – the ‘yards’ reference, drinks measures and even the Horrible Histories books. It embodies the definitive Yards sound, with depth and drama, light and shadow. There are great pop tunes, breathtaking love songs, such as Last High and Let It Go, raucous rock riffs in Cars and Broken. And fantastic strings arrangements throughout.

Imperial Measures was written, recorded, engineered and produced by the band, and released on their own label, Industrial Erotica Records. The Sheds’ Fraser Smith mixed the album.

The album was mastered by John Davies, who mastered U2’s latest album and did the Led Zeppelin re-masters. Joe Wilson designed the album artwork, which features the puppets of the five members, used in the photograph here.

John says the band is pleased with the results.

“I’m really proud of what we’ve done,” said John. “The nice thing is it’s been a real team effort.”

For tickets for tomorrow’s gig, which cost £7 advance/ £9 on the door, visit theduchessyork.co.uk, or phone 01904 641413.

To buy the album, visit myspace/theyardsband