Songwriting and production duo Topham & Twigg have pitched some of their “best songs ever” for Steps’ next album.
The pair worked with the Something In Your Eyes group regularly during their late ’90s/early ’00s heyday, penning and producing massive hits including One For Sorrow, Deeper Shade of Blue, Stomp and Summer of Love.
While Karl Twigg returned to the fold on the group’s most recent release, What The Future Holds, with album cut Heartbreak in This City, Topham & Twigg haven’t featured collectively on any of the band’s releases since their 2017 comeback.
Speaking to Retro Pop, however, Karl confirmed he and Mark Topham are back together and better than ever, revealing: “Myself and Mark have penned three or four songs… Which is our first co-pen for about 10 years!
“We’ve written a new track, which we penned about three months ago now, and it is f**king amazing. It’s probably one of the best songs we’ve ever written.
“In fact, there’s about three that we’ve penned that are just stone-cold monster hits.”
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Despite the pair’s celebrated history with the group, Karl insists they’ve “avoided the whole nostalgia thing” on the new tracks, but described the songs as “bangers”.
Although he was unable to confirm any further details about a possible new album from the Steps, he explains: “The band’s got to move on, but we’ve moved on quite a lot as well.
“So anything we do for Steps in the future is not going to sound nostalgic at all. It’s going to sound groundbreaking.
“There are parts [in the new tracks] that are very Depeche Mode for the boys to sing, so they get their own featured vocal, and each part is such a hook.
“On this new stuff, there is no letdown at all,” he adds. “From the minute the song starts to the little outro adlibs, your attention is 100% pulled into it.
“There’s so much going on and so much moving melodically, production-wise… It’s just fantastic!”
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And it’s not just the new tracks that have got Topham & Twigg excited – they’re working on a number of projects, including a Christmas song with the group in mind.
Karl previously penned Steps’ 2012 holiday single, Light Up The World, but he insists the new tune won’t have the same “mature” sound.
“That Christmas album, I really didn’t get it. It was a bit strange,” he reflects, revealing the pair are “mid-way through” writing a new “all-out Christmas song”.
Steps returned in 2020 with their sixth album, What The Future Holds, featuring the singles What The Future Holds, Something In Your Eyes and new release, To The Beat of My Heart.
In our review of the album, Retro Pop called What The Future Holds the group’s “most confident, polished release yet” which “plays to each of the members’ strengths and showcases the versatility of Steps as Britain’s premier pop group”.
Steps’ sixth album, What The Future Holds, is out now. Catch the group on tour across the UK from November 2021 – tickets are available here.
