The Coral have spoken to NME about quietly releasing their surprise new album ‘388’ in record stores nearly a fortnight ago, ahead of officially sharing the project today (Thursday May 21). Read on for more on how the “raw” collection came about, and listen to lead single ‘Let The Music Play’.
On May 8, copies of the LP appeared in independent vinyl shops across the UK completely unannounced. While it was clearly by The Coral, the band hadn’t commented on social media or anywhere else about the record, or confirmed they were behind the 11 new songs.
Now, the five-piece have broken their silence and explained to NME why they wanted to surprise fans with a new full-length effort – three years on from releasing both ‘Sea Of Mirrors’ and ‘Holy Joe’s Coral Island Medicine Show’ on the same day in 2023. It comes as ‘388’ arrives to the wider world via online streaming platforms and in high street music stockists nationwide.
“Releasing an album this way keeps us interested and keeps the fans interested too,” said frontman James Skelly of the initial low-key drop. “The idea was to release it how records used to be released: people can just have it for a couple of weeks, and it isn’t explained to anyone.”
Keyboardist Nick Power added: “Half the idea was that people would see it and think that, because we hadn’t announced anything, that ‘388’ might be a bootleg. We wanted people to wonder: ‘What is this?’ Not saying anything about it since it’s been out has been the hardest aspect.”
Skelly joked: “I felt a bit snide not reacting when people are tagging me in posts saying how much they love it.”
‘388’ was inspired by the nostalgia for The Coral’s beginnings as teenagers, as documented in the 2024 book The Making Of The Debut Album about their 2002 self-titled album and a documentary about the band’s history, 2025’s Dreaming Of You.
“Watching our documentary reminded me of how lyrically direct some of our early songs were,” Skelly told NME. “We needed to get back to that. I’d skirt around lyrics about love, when I shouldn’t. I’m trying to get the message across now as directly and emotionally as possible.”
Check out NME’s full interview with The Coral below, where they talk more about their sneaky approach to releasing the “back to basics” ‘388’, capturing the “infectious” spirit of the ’70s Zambian scene, being inspired by Brooke Combe, regretting their feud with Andrew W.K., and their love of ’00s eclecticism.
NME: Hi, James and Nick. Congratulations on the new album – and for surprising everyone by releasing it so unexpectedly.
James Skelly: Thanks! ‘388’ is our 13th album. If you’re not massive by your 13th record, you might as well try to be interesting. Hopefully, releasing an album like this is engaging for the fans. It’s not really for anyone else; it’s for the fans who have stuck by us. We released multiple versions of our album ‘Coral Island’, so it’s nice to do something simple as a contrast: one vinyl LP, that’s it.”
It’s an energetic, very raw sound.
Skelly: “‘Sea Of Mirrors’ was a big, orchestral record. That record needed to be presented more, but ‘388’ doesn’t need a big fanfare. We felt everything we do needs simplifying, as everything – music, films – has got over-complicated.
“We’ve tried to get back to basics. The sound and the way this has been released is the simplest it can be.”
Nick Power: “There’s nothing sophisticated on this album, and that’s by design. Songs on the radio now, you can hear how everyone has been to the same songwriters.
“It’s harder now to strip music back to the bare bones. You’ve got to commit to making your music raw, because the instinct is to fix things and make it better. It’s more of a discipline to strip it right back and not fuck with it afterwards.”
Skelly: “We made this in a way that you can’t fuck with it. We’re all in the room together, playing on top of each other, so that you can’t really change anything. If you try to turn the bass up, it’ll also turn the drums up. Why do another take when it sounds good already?”
What was influencing that energy?
Power: “When we made our first album, we listened to a lot of Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry and rocksteady. Culture moved away from that in guitar bands, and so did we. We’d closed the door on sounding like our first record. It’s good that we didn’t want to repeat ourselves and wanted to move on, but we’ve got back into that music because we loved it.”
Skelly: “Artists have an attitude of rejecting something because ‘It sounds too much like us’, and I think that’s stupid. We had so many stabbing keyboards in our early days that we moved away from it. Getting back into that music has been great.
“We got a keyboard in the band in the first place because of The Specials. ‘Ghost Town’ was the song we agreed on as something we could pull off, so we got a keyboard. We loved that angular, spooky keyboard sound that you also had in The Teardrop Explodes and Madness.”
What else have you been listening to?
Power: “Late on in recording, we got into Zamrock: ’70s music from Zambia. There was a ban on Western music there, so musicians tried to recreate the sound of The Rolling Stones. It’s such a naïve and innocent, joyous way of playing that it’s dead infectious. It sounds like a youth club, and we wanted that spirit on ‘388’. The scene at the Zanzibar club in Liverpool in the early ’00s had a similar spirit.”
Skelly: “For our documentary, we watched footage of those Zanzibar bands. No-one really knew about that scene. Seeing bands like The Hokum Clones and Tramp Attack again inspired us.”
Where does the album title ‘388’ come from?
Skelly: “On the Zanzibar scene, everyone recorded on cheap Tascam 388 tape machines. We’ve got a studio with a nice tape machine, but part of keeping it raw was to use a 388. We cheated a bit, because we mixed what we recorded, but then we bounced it down to just one track on the 388. The hissing sound of the 388 did send me a bit mad.”
You went on a Q&A tour for your book. What did you learn from the fans’ questions?
Power: “Fans asked us some really bizarre stuff. It was a learning process for us, because we hadn’t got our story together about the band’s history, as we couldn’t remember it.”
Skelly: “It was like regression therapy. There’s no other job where you have to work out your own timeline. I’d been quite scared of doing it, and it was strange, but I’m glad I’ve done it now.
“I learned a lot about that period of music in general. That era is unexplored, and it was less about the algorithm. Lots of different creative music was happening at the same time as us: The Streets, The Bees, Ms. Dynamite, So Solid Crew.”
The song ‘Leave It In The Past’ talks about the need to move on. Are you good at that?
Skelly: “If you can’t leave something in the past, you’re not going to be able to sustain a relationship. We’re still in the band together, still hanging out with the same people. And I’ve been married for 12 years.”
Have the band had any feuds you’ve had to leave in the past?
Skelly: “We had one with Andrew W.K., when we were on an NME Tour [in 2002] with him, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and… we won’t speak about the other band [Lostprophets].”
Power: “We were like naughty kids, who the older kids egged on to be naughtier. That’s how we got into most of our trouble. Andrew W.K. started it by being shit, though. But he was a nice feller, so it wasn’t his fault.”
Skelly: “He was really nice about it all, so I felt like a tit. And that was the end of it. Playing to his fans, ‘Skeleton Key’ was the only song they connected to. But I quite liked that, as everyone is too much in their box now, and I liked that the tour was a mixture.”
Where else do you see the new album’s energy in current music?
Skelly: “I think we’re only coming out of the spirit of lockdown in the past 18 months. People had gravitated towards quieter music, and we need something more collective now. There’s a Northern Soul revival among younger people. Maybe everyone is looking for that collective spirit, and we certainly were.
“I’ve produced The Rosettis, who are 17 and sound like a cross between Big Star and Joe Emerson. They’re really good. I love Talise, a folk-country singer from Canada. And Brooke Combe was a massive inspiration on this album.”
What else are you both working on?
Skelly: “I’ve just produced The Mary Wallopers’ new album. I’m the busiest I’ve been in my life since we first started.”
Power: “I’ve got a novel coming out with a new publisher, Road Song. It’s a darkly comic story about drugs and murder.”
It seems The Coral are in a chilled place as a band…
Skelly: “Stuff doesn’t bother us as much. We’ve rediscovered an attitude of ‘Fuck ’em’. It’s too late to go back, because we are what we are. We can’t change now, so there’s no point getting stressed over anything.”
The Coral’s new album ‘388’ is out now on Run On. The full tracklist is as follows:
‘Let The Music Play’
‘Ride That Train’
‘Leave It In The Past’
‘You & Me (And The Beautiful Sea)’
‘Shame’
‘Here Come The Tears’
‘Yellow Moon’
‘Sad Girl’
‘High Tide’
‘Spirit Catcher’
‘Crossing The Sands’
The Coral’s live tour dates for 2026 are below. Visit here for tickets and more informtion.
JUNE
12 – Southampton Summer Sessions, Guildhall Square, Southampton (with Amy Macdonald)
18 – Piece Hall, Halifax (with Amy Macdonald)
27 – Chelmsford State Fayre, Hylands Park, Chelmsford
JULY
12 – Electric Heart Festival, Apps Court, Walton-on-Thames
18-19 – We Are Wirral, Birkenhead Park
24 – Tramlines, Hillsborough Park, Sheffield
25-26 – Rock Oyster, Rock, Cornwall
AUGUST
21 – Trentham Live, Trentham Gardens (with Madness)
28 – Victorious, Southsea Seafront
29 – Wythenshawe Park, Manchester (with Courteeners)
30 – Big Feastival, Alex James’ Farm, Kingham