SINGAPORE — Listening to rock band Caracal’s sophomore effort, Welcome The Ironists, one cannot help but be impressed by its quality. It’s clear that the band — comprising vocalist KC Meals, guitarists Field Teo and Gabriel De Souza, as well as new bassist Jude Lee — has taken the music to a different level since releasing its debut Bear. Shark. Wolf.

“With Bear.Shark.Wolf. we were more concerned with filling an album,” Teo admitted. “We were a lot younger then and perhaps focused more on the idea of releasing a full-length. For Welcome The Ironists, all of us were on the same page, from the songwriting to the production of the album.”

But perhaps more than that, the tone of the new material strongly reflected a certain internal conflict. “We have always written songs that relate to what we go through in our lives,” Meals explained. “And the phrase ‘I hate that I love this chaos’ from the single Welcome The Ironists portrays us perfectly as a band. It’s challenging being a musician in Singapore, be it meeting for practice or writing or recording. All those activities can take place only after work and normally run into the wee hours of the morning.”

According to Teo, Welcome The Ironists was originally conceived as a five-track EP — and was intended to be the band’s swansong. Their previous bassist, Henry Velge, had decided to leave the band during the recording process. Coupled with “other internal band matters”, said Teo, the band wasn’t sure whether it would carry on.

“We were at our wits’ end,” he recalled. “To make matters worse, we were also fighting against the clock because we had booked our mastering date to coincide with our trip to Toronto for our show at Canadian Music Week, which was scheduled for May 9 this year.”

In the midst of such adversity, Caracal made a critical decision — to go ahead to produce a full-length instead. “Looking back now, that was a crazy idea considering we had only five or six weeks to write, record and mix five new songs,” Teo confessed. “I guess we felt like we had nothing else to lose.”

This renewed purpose and sense of urgency resulted in many late nights but the band completed the task — barely — with a little help from a friend.

“A standout memory during the recording process would be our friend and producer Leonard Soosay cooped up in the studio at 1am in the morning, tirelessly tweaking and mixing the 10 tracks we had to master,” said Teo.

All things considered, Welcome The Ironists is a testament to the team spirit of Caracal and Teo is understandably proud of the achievement.

“I think we can say our job is done,” he said. “The struggle to create this album was very real and we hope listeners will be able to feel that roller-coaster ride we went through.”

Welcome The Ironists will be launched on Dec 18 at The Substation. Tickets are available at http://welcometheironists.peatix.com. You can pre-order the album from https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/welcome-the-ironists/id935397033