So you're a guitar band that's just made your best and most accessible record to date, but your label is in the process of focusing all of its attention on electronic music, and the masses are still oblivious to the sublime pop you've been refining for the better part of a decade. What happens next?

If you're Versus, you consider throwing in the towel, then think better of it, hook up a deal with your friends ' label and continue recording at your rehearsal space.

"[Caroline] became a dance-music label or electronic-music label in between 1996's Secret Swingers and 1998's Two Cents Plus Tax," explains singer/guitarist Richard Baluyut. "I mean, there was still Caroline, but we were like the only thing left on Caroline basically-everything else was Astralwerks. I think because of that we were the only people playing guitars left. It just didn't really seem like the right thing, but we were both contractually bound to do it They just had so many other things that were so much more popular that they had to spend their time on those things. I'm not bitter about the whole thing, I just think that it probably should have ended a record earlier.

For those familiar with what Versus had been brewing up since the early '90s, Two Cents Plus Tax, featuring hooks aplenty and such epic pop blasts as "Atomic Kid," "Morning Glory" and "Underground," seemed like the record that would finally gain them the commercial success they so richly deserve.

"Well, you know, you always hope that," admits Baluyut. "And we did spend a lot of time on that record, and we spent the most money we've ever spent on trying to have it sound good on the radio or whatever. But I think inherently we're probably not that type of band."

"[Caroline] made us feel like they were really pushing it, and I think they did," explains bassist/singer Fontaine Toups. "I think they did an okay job. I don't really know. You don't know what's going to happen. But yeah, there was that realisation that, Oh, okay, it didn't go over the top and it may never. So then you start to think about things differently. I think we've kind of come to that realisation in the past couple years. But it feels fresh again in a way, like we don't have to worry about it. Now we're just playing music and having fun like we used to when we started."

On Hurrah, Versus' first full-length for Merge and fourth studio LP overall, the band sounds as excited about playing music as it did on its debut EP 1993's Let's Electrify!; Hurrah is a beautifully crafted work that nods to the band's past while heading into uncharted territory. Versus' sharply melodic sound, aided and abetted by Baluyut and Toups' intoxicating harmonies, is without a doubt one of indie rock's most immediately recognisable, though the quartet-which also includes guitarist James Baluyut and drummer Pat Ramos-is well aware that stagnation equals death. The group consistently surprises itself, which in turn surprises and captivates its listeners. It's a way of working that has placed Versus on indie rock's throne and which prompted the band to ditch the studio and record Hurrah by themselves at their practice pad located in Manhattan's Music Building.

"We thought it might be interesting to do it in a different way," says Richard, who co-produced the record with his brother. "We've always been in regular recording studios, which means you have to be fully prepared to do it in order not to waste all your money."

Richard says that fighting with the noise out on 8th Avenue was a bit of a challenge, but that the group perfected a way to minimise sonic intrusions by its practising neighbours.

"You kind of just get to know the schedule of the metal bands next door-just from experience you know that they come in from here to here," he says. "That's kind of a tough one to record over. But we've recorded over other bands. Like this band with a girl singer-kind of a poppy band. We can record over them while they're rehearsing."

"It's funny because you have this huge police door that seals you off from the rest of the building. Every room has it. You feel like you're, you know, in prison."

In contrast to their confines, the band didn't feel incarcerated by its recording schedule. Merge-which released the group's last two EPs, Afterglow (made up of songs recorded during the Two Cents Plus Tax sessions) and Shangri-La (a concept EP which fea-tured their own "Shangri-La" in addition to covers of the Kinks ' "Shangri-La,"The Shangri-La's' "Out In The Streets" and Electric Light Orchestra's "Shangri-La")- placed very few restrictions on the band, which spent nearly a year making Hurrah.

"We finished it in like early June, and only because someone gave us a final deadline," says Richard. "That's the drawback of recording it by yourselves, because you just become ridiculous perfectionists. You can take forever to do it really. And if you know that you have to get it done, then you start to make concessions, you know? Which are usually good, usually you improve things anyway. We always work better under a deadline. I know that I can't write lyrics until it's absolutely necessary, until it has to be handed in. We wanted to get it out in the fall. If we didn't hand it in then-we were already late as it was-it would have had to come out next year"

Though Toups says she appreciated the freedom that went along with recording themselves, Richard points out that the one song on Hurrah not recorded at the Music Building-"Frederick's Of Hollywood," a dark and heavy rocker about alien abduction that was done in Portland at Larry Crane's Jackpot! -proved to him that they probably won 't do another album on their own.

"We might use it for a couple things, but I don't think we would do it for a whole thing," he admits. "I think it 's still good as an alternative, but certainly not as the only way But you know, it was definitely a good experience. We learned a lot about recording and all that jazz. But we're not pronouncing it as the wave of the future."

"I think, really for Richard and Jimmy they were there every day," says Toups when explaining why she probably didn 't feel her bandmates' pain. "I was probably there 80 percent of the time, and Pat was maybe there half the time, because Pat and I were both working. But for those guys, I mean, I think it was pretty intense, because it was the two of them, and you know, they're brothers, so it's a lot of work. You can imagine working for 12 hours at a time and being a perfectionist like Richard, it's difficult to achieve your goals if you don't have a professional sitting there going, 'Okay, I can do that.' I mean, for us, we had to figure it out. But personally I'm gonna do my [solo] stuff this way."

Though perhaps not as immediately gripping as Two Cents Plus Tax, Hurrah does eventually prove to be equally enthralling. From "My Adidas," the dreamy opener inspired by the Heaven's Gate cult but factually altered to fit Richard's footwear preference ("I know they weren't wearing Adidas-they were wearing Nike, but I have a personal distaste for that company"), to the hyper jangle of "Eskimo" ("I didn't even know what it was until it was finished", he says. "Someone said that at the very beginning it sounds like 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' - if it got the reception that that song had we'd be happy with that") to the driving, Toups-sung "I Love The WB" (which has nothing to do with the television network), Hurrah proves to the world that guitar-based pop is still alive and well. And especially during the more classic-Versus-sounding "Said Too Much" and the piano-driven, "Oscillate Wildly"-esque "Walkabout", listeners feel like they've been granted a very special wish when they're tuned in to Hurrah.

"I like it a lot better than [Two Cents Plus Tax]," says Toups. "Just the way it sounds. And the songs, I think, are better It's more interesting to me. It's more appealing to my ear. I listen to it almost every day and I didn 't do that with Two Cents."

But before we go, there are two somewhat unsettling things included on Hurrah that are hard to overlook: the mention of every label and a slew of bands they've played with on the inlay card that reads like a last will and testament, and the fact that Richard seems to be saying goodbye an awful lot on this record. The latter isn 't lost on Toups.

"Well, I think the recording process for Richard was really difficult", she says. "It just became too much for him. Like the stress was just too much. At a certain point I felt like I had to mediate between Richard and Jimmy because it was difficult. But for me, I don't know, I can always deal with that kind of stuff. Richard's just a very intense person.he 's very extreme, but that's what makes him brilliant. And yeah, there was a moment when, like when I was listening to 'My Adidas,' or like just lyrics even, it sounds like he's saying goodbye. But I would always ask him and he would just be like, 'I don't know, I don't know.' I've been asking him for months. I'm like, 'What does this mean? Let's sit down and talk. What are you talking about?' He's like, 'I don't know, what do you mean? Don't worry about it.'

"I think there was that feeling when we were recording this record that - l mean, Richard and I have been in this band for 10 years," continues Toups, who is in the process of making her first solo record with the help of Joe McGinty (who has worked with Richard Davies,The Ramones The Psychedelic Furs and many others). "It's like, 'Should we keep doing this ?' You question yourself. It's like, when do you stop? When do you know that enough is enough? I mean, we don't want to make bad records."

"There might have been a point where I felt like, This could be the last one," admits Richard. "And sure, we hadn 't thanked anyone on records in a long time. We thought it would be cool if it were the last one. But I don 't think it is the last one."

And what about the lyrics?

"I actually felt this overwhelming sense of goodbye while doing this one," says Baluyut. "I felt like there's a lot of kind like escape or leaving kind of themes. It seemed like a time where it seemed like I was just about to blast off, you know. Certain relationships come to an end and you can see something else starting to begin. I felt like that was what was going on when we were doing this record."

Where is all this coming from?

"Probably because I hate New York," he says. "And I want to get the hell out of here. But we haven't found anywhere else that's cool enough to go to. I kind of want to live in the mountains or some-thing and have like goats and stuff like that [laughs]. I grew up in a suburb and I've been in New York for a long time, so I was thinking somewhere rural would be kind of cool. Basically just because I've been here since '84 and I just don't want to always live in the same place. There are so many other cool cities out there, or cool places. But if you don 't make yourself leave then you never will."

I mention the goats to Toups, as well as the fact that Richard also said something about wanting to move to London or Paris.

"You see what we have to deal with?" she says. "That's the thing. Richard always has these grand ideas. You just never know what he's thinking. You never know what to expect from him, and think that's why we have been able to be in this band for so long. Because it never gets boring. He's full of surprises. He never ceases to amaze me."

So let's cut to the chase: Do you think you guys might break up ?

"Uh [pregnant pause], I don't think so," says Toups, who pointed out earlier that the band is looking forward to hitting the road in support of Hurrah. "I mean, you never know what's gonna happen. You just never know, I hope not. I don't want that to happen. Because that would be really sad."

"Not that I know of," answers Richard with a confusing laugh. "I don't think so. I feel like I want to do more songs somewhat soon, whereas when we started, I was like, Hmm, I think maybe we're running out of songs-running out of the inspiration to do songs. But when you actually do a record, then you think, Oh well, we can do a song like this. It's just a process of regenerating your-self whenever you do a record. Kind of like from the caterpillar to the butterfly [laughs]."

"I'm really excited about the record," Toups says with convincing enthusiasm. "I'm really proud of it and I want everyone to hear it, like all my friends. I don't have enough promo copes to give to everyone. But yeah, I think it's great. I love it."

This article is © Devil In The Woods magazine, and has been reproduced with their kind permission. Interview conducted by Marc Hawthorne.