I wanted us to finish our journey on a high'

Saint Etienne are calling it a day after 35 years. They discuss their final album, turning down Cher's Believe and a career defined by friendship and invention

- Fergal Kinney

In Saint Etienne, it is usually Bob Stanley who suggests the band's tightly defined album concepts. What if you graft folk melodies to dance music? Make vaporwave about early New Labour? Last winter, Stanley pitched an even starker one: the end of their band.

"I didn't think I was saying anything uncomfortable or shocking," says Stanley, in a park near his Bradford home. "When you've known each other for so long you have a psychic thing anyway. It felt like we would all agree."

I meet Pete Wiggs and Sarah Cracknell in a London bar, separate from Stanley. "Once I got used to it, I thought it was a great idea," says Wiggs. "We've not split up acrimoniously, and have some control over it."

International, out in September, will be the final Saint Etienne album. Bringing together collaborators including Nick Heyward, Xenomania, Erol Alkan and the Chemical Brothers, the album is a strictly-bangers leaving party for one of the most singular bands in British indie. "I wanted to finish our album journey on a high," says Cracknell.

Stanley remembers a time in pop when most groups did finish, powering pop's forward motion. He argues that it has slowed, pointing to the decade it took for the hyperpop music on the PC Music record label - which he adored - to reach the mainstream on Charli xcx's Brat last year.