Content Guide
Cast Sound Hungrier Than Ever (Yeah Yeah Yeah Review)
Yeah Yeah Yeah Review: Cast have always existed in that frustrating space where the music deserved more attention than it received. While the Gallagher brothers dominated headlines and Damon Albarn smirked through mockumentaries, John Power was writing songs that hit just as hard but never quite grabbed the same cultural stranglehold. Thirty years on from their debut, the Liverpool quartet return with “Yeah Yeah Yeah,” and there’s something different about this one. It sounds like a band that finally stopped worrying about what they’re supposed to be.
The timing couldn’t be better. Cast spent 2025 opening all nineteen UK and Ireland shows on the Oasis reunion tour, playing to stadium crowds at Wembley, Heaton Park, Croke Park, and Edinburgh’s Murrayfield. That wasn’t nostalgia booking. Liam Gallagher rang Power directly and made it happen, telling him he wanted the tour to start properly with “a rock ‘n’ roll chord” before literally singing the opening of “Sandstorm” down the phone. Those two go back to when Cast supported an unsigned Oasis, so seeing them share those massive stages again felt like history completing a circle.
The brass and groove of Poison Vine (Yeah Yeah Yeah Review)
“Poison Vine” landed first and immediately sounded nothing like the Cast most people remember. It’s built on a swagger and groove rather than the jangle and rush of their 90s classics. The real shock comes when soul legend P.P. Arnold arrives on vocals, trading lines with Power in a way that instantly recalls Merry Clayton tearing through “Gimme Shelter.” When those voices collide, something electric happens. Power knew they had captured something special the moment he heard it back.
Youth produced the track at his Space Mountain studio in Spain, which probably explains why it sounds so loose and unafraid. Brass sections weave through the arrangement in unexpected places. Liam “Skin” Tyson’s guitar finds different spaces to occupy between the main riffs. The whole thing has a freedom that Cast haven’t quite achieved on record before. Arnold joined them onstage at Heaton Park to perform it live, and apparently the crowd went absolutely mental.
Gospel soul and string sections push the sound wider (Yeah Yeah Yeah Review)
“Calling Out Your Name” arrived in October and reminded everyone that this band still understand how to construct a massive chorus. The guitars announce themselves immediately, loud and urgent, while Power’s voice retains that worn in Liverpool grain. Gospel soul vocals build throughout until the finale hits like a wave. It’s meant to be about self love and empowerment, which could easily tip into cheesy territory, but the arrangement is so genuinely uplifting that you find yourself wanting to sing along anyway.
“Free Love” goes even bigger. Strings give the track proper arena scale without feeling overblown. This one and “Don’t Look Away” apparently became huge anthems while they were recording them, and you can hear why within the first thirty seconds. There’s an inclusive quality to the sound that only certain bands can achieve without seeming calculated. Cast pull it off because earnestness has always been their default setting. They’ve never played it cool or ironic.
Then “Way It’s Gotta Be (Oh Yeah)” arrives and throws everything sideways. P.P. Arnold returns for what Power describes as a psychedelic funk track, which sounds bizarre on paper but works completely. The opening is genuinely funky before the whole thing morphs into something more aggressive, drawing comparisons to Ocean Colour Scene at their peak but pushing into jam territory. After three decades of playing together, the band lock in with an ease that only comes from genuine friendship and chemistry.
Power back on bass changes everything (Yeah Yeah Yeah Review)
Cast have operated as a three piece since Peter Wilkinson left in 2015. Power handles bass on recordings now while Jay Lewis supports on tour. This matters more than it sounds like it should. Power was the bassist in The La’s before forming Cast, so returning to the instrument has reconnected him with something fundamental in his approach. Last year’s “Love Is the Call” started this shift, but “Yeah Yeah Yeah” sounds like they’ve fully grown into this new configuration.
The quieter tracks prove the point. “Devil and the Deep” strips everything back to acoustic guitar and melancholic strings. Power has mentioned it as a personal favorite, which makes sense. It provides breathing room between the anthems and reminds you there’s always been delicacy underneath Cast’s bigger moments. “Birds Heading South” closes the album with a wistful quality that evokes coming of age films and end credits sequences. “Teardrops” occupies similar emotional territory, capturing that classic Cast melancholy that made “Walkaway” connect so deeply the first time around.
The album exists because the stars aligned (Yeah Yeah Yeah Review)
Timing made this record possible. Late 2024, Youth’s schedule cleared, his studio was available, and the band had a window. Power hadn’t played the new songs for anyone except manager Alan McGee, but they both felt something was there worth pursuing. They arrived at the mountaintop studio just as the almond trees were blossoming, which Power took as providence. The sessions captured a liberated energy that runs through every track.
Youth has produced everyone from The Verve to Pink Floyd to Primal Scream, and he calls this album majestic. McGee, never one for understatement, suggests it might be the best record Cast have ever made. Normally you’d dismiss that as manager hype, but listening to these singles, it doesn’t sound like empty promotion. There’s a confidence threading through this material that previous reunion efforts lacked.
This moment carries weight beyond the music (Yeah Yeah Yeah Review)
Britpop is having a proper moment right now. Oasis reunited and instantly sold out arenas. Blur and Pulp are playing to massive crowds. Shed Seven finally scored their first number one. Into this environment comes Cast, a band whose debut “All Change” outsold first albums by The Who, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, and The Jam at Polydor. They landed seven top ten singles. Noel Gallagher once called watching them live a religious experience.
Yet somehow they became filed under “lesser Britpop bands” while their contemporaries received endless retrospective celebrations. “Yeah Yeah Yeah” challenges that narrative directly. Playing to two million people across the Oasis tour put them back in front of audiences who either missed them originally or forgot how good they were at their peak.
The album navigates between Cast’s various modes without getting caught in any single gear. Gospel tinged anthems sit beside hard rocking moments and acoustic vulnerability. “Weight of the World” apparently just absolutely rocks with a chorus built for stadiums, while “Don’t Look Away” channels pure Britpop energy with hints of George Harrison’s Indian mysticism woven throughout. It’s a record that knows what Cast do well and leans into those strengths, while the psychedelic funk detours prove they’re still willing to take chances.
A band finding their second peak (Yeah Yeah Yeah Review)
There’s real satisfaction in watching a group reach this point in their career. Cast never stopped working, but they also never quite recaptured the momentum that evaporated after “Beetroot” underperformed in 2001 and they initially split. The reunion albums kept them going without setting anything on fire. “Love Is the Call” changed that dynamic last year, receiving their strongest notices in decades and setting up this release perfectly.
“Yeah Yeah Yeah” doesn’t try to recreate 1995. It sounds like musicians in their fifties who have figured out exactly who they are and what they want to create. Power’s songwriting still delivers instant hooks while the arrangements show more sophistication and layers. Youth’s production gives everything space to develop without losing the punch that makes Cast work in a live setting.
Early word suggests this is landing exactly as it should. Fans seem genuinely excited. Critics are responding. People are remembering why Cast mattered in the first place. The Oasis tour reminded audiences these songs still work in massive spaces. “Yeah Yeah Yeah” gives those audiences a reason to invest again rather than just indulge in nostalgia.
Three decades after “All Change” established them, Cast sound less like survivors trading on past glories and more like a band hitting a genuine creative peak at exactly the right moment. The stage is set. The record drops January 30th. Everything aligns.
Listen To “Yeah Yeah Yeah” By Cast
You can listen here.
He discovered the gem when he was 12 years old and still has it now, claiming it to be why he fell in love with music. He likes to play disc golf when he's not writing about music. He is a one-of-a-kind individual who is always the first to bust out his air guitar on the dance-floor.
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