THERE are various reasons for making double albums, not all of them good: too many ideas, songwriting rivalry, ego trips, somebody came up with a concept… None of these apply to Scots rockers Biffy Clyro, whose decision to spread their sixth album across a wider canvas appears to stem from a more basic impulse: having loads of songs and wanting to use them all right now. The result is that, while Opposites is anything but a flop, it’s also their first really false step.

‘The Biff’ are a band you want to see succeed. They didn’t rely on hype or slavering, flavour-of-the-month attention; they used hard graft, patience and solid, honest rock songwriting principles. Those principles are immediately on show here: Different People is classic slow-burning, pace-changing Biffy, Black Chandelier fuses Eighties pop with Nineties slacker-rock, there are spidery riffs (Sounds Like Balloons, The Joke’s On Us), big choruses (Biblical) and beauty (Opposite). So what’s the problem?

The problem isn’t the quality of Opposites, but its size. Biffy Clyro are talented, but narrow, and on the second side of this 20-song album, the angular anthems and ballads – their songs are either one or the other – become interchangeable and laboured through lack of variety. Trimmed to 11 or 12 tracks, Opposites would have taken some beating; at this length, with good songs wasted because of their setting, it’s repetitious and self-defeating. It’s harsh to knock a band for doing too much of what they do best, but Biffy Clyro have exposed flaws and limitations which could have remained hidden.

• Biffy Clyro play Sheffield Motorpoint Arena on March 23.