The Beautiful South revel in contrasts.

Over the course of a five album, ten-year career, the band have developed a reputation as clever pop craftsmen capable of delivering charming melodiesàwith a caustic twist. Like candied apples pregnant with razor blades, their sweet melodies belie an insidious lyrical center.

Former Housemartins bandmates Paul Heaton (vocals) and Dave Hemingway are the willful architects of this artistic double-cross, an approach that has gotten the pair in trouble more than once.

"It's often said that we're a bit too clever for our own good, that people don't get the message," explains Hemingway. "But I'm not sure that's true. I think people are a lot more intelligent than they're given credit for."

The band is also accused of being too English, of allowing their Hull roots to stand in the way of greater fame stateside. "I don't agree with that one either," says Hemingway. "We all speak the same language."

Nonetheless, something strange is at play. While the band has been wildly popular in England -- their 1994 compilation Carry On Up The Charts did just that, becoming one of the best-selling albums in British history -- they've never quite broken through in the U.S.

"I don't think (Americans) know what slot to put it in really," Hemingway says with a laugh. "Maybe it's our fault. I don't know. We had a number one [single] over here with 'A Little Time' [off of 1990's Choke], but it was (mis)perceived as a country and western track in America. I think we're accessible to a lot more people than we seem to be getting through to."

With their latest release, Blue Is The Colour on Stewart Copelands's Ark 21 imprint, the band is poised to make another run at stateside success. Still treading the same caustic ground as before, Heaton seems to have perfected the difficult balance between poignant and droll, as in this lyric from "Liar's Bar:"

Delivered with the affected rasp of a lifelong drinker, the song evokes a place where misery and humor can coexist over a pint of beer. It's the sort of setting that might suit a music veteran like Hemingway, a man who knows better than to look too far into the future.

"We've been going nearly ten years now, and we never look beyond the next," he admits. "We don't want to turn in to some kind of dinosaurs, chatting our stuff up past our sell-by date. We enjoy doin' the records and doin' the singles and everything that comes with it. As long as that continues, we'll continue to make records."

BRANDON BARBER