Dregen may be missing, again, but that hasn’t stopped Nicke Andersson delivering what is, in many ways, the classiest Hellacopters album yet…

And whilst the terms ‘active rock’ and ‘classy’ may seem to share an aeons-long enmity, Ol’ Nick manages to fuse them together here, very often in spectacular style and with engrossing, exciting results.

Opener Token Apologies melds honking keys, celebratory soloing and the sort of Cheap-Trick-meets-The-Beatles chorusing most bands can only dream of – but which Andersson apparently peels off in his sleep – and from then on it’s high quality thrills and spills all the way over the course of eleven coruscating slices of class.

If forced to highlight, erm, highlights, then I’d say the aching alt.rocky gloriousness of Don’t Let Me Bring You Down is pretty damn good, Andersson’s anthemic guitars causing riotous goosebump breakouts and his restrained but oh-so-good vocals coming close to bringing the house down… elsewhere Soldier On and Doomsday Daydreams aren’t far behind whilst closer Leave A Mark is stadium action rock in excelsis – Andersson’s solo at the end is worth the price of admission on it’s own – but the best of all is probably (I Don’t Wanna Be) Just A Memory, which brings everything I’ve mentioned already together in one glorious mashup for the ages. You won’t be able to stop smiling while you listen, I promise you!

But who am I kidding? In picking out highlights I’m denying what makes this album so great, and that’s the fact that there are, quite honestly, no lowlights. Not one point in the album drags, not a single track demands deployment of the fast forward button. There’s no downtime on Overdriver, and that’s something you can’t say about too many albums in this day and age. Kudos to all involved, but most especially the mainman, who cements his reputation as one of the greats of Swedish rock time and again all over this fabulous album…

Overdriver is out now.