It’s looking like our long wait for the 12th studio album by Madness may nearly be over. In a recent interview on the Talking to Mod podcast, Chris Foreman reported that the new collection of 14 tracks will be released on November 17, 2023. Darren Bowen of Madzine and our bons amis at French M.I.S. are further reporting that the album is titled C’est la Vie (also the name of the band’s upcoming UK tour, and taken from one of the new song titles). It will reportedly be available in a standard edition of 14 tracks, as well as a deluxe edition with five bonus tracks.

Chrissy Boy says the album was recorded at the band’s new rehearsal facility in London’s Cricklewood neighborhood, which we first glimpsed in Suggs and Mike’s 2020 Two Mad Men and a String Quartet pandemic lockdown performance. In the Talking to Mod interview, Chris is quite enthusiastic about the new album: “I think it’s a very good body of work.” He says he “got a bit edgy” in some of his lyrics, citing new track “Run for Your Life” as possibly the best song he’s ever written, and offering high praise for the band’s new sound engineer, Matt Glasbey.

Previous reports from band members on the new album’s progress held that they were trying to decide whether to call it Theatre of the Absurd (after a Suggs composition) or C’est la Vie. Personally I’ve been been hoping for Theatre of the Absurd, since Madness already had that one other French-inflected album title not so long ago, and the other conjures marvelously mad imagery for cover art, complete with a British spelling built in. But anyway, the above details are yet to be officially confirmed, so who knows? That’s life.

Stay tuned to Stateside Madness for late-breaking album news as it develops!