LONDON — A decade into his band's career, Charlatans U.K. singer Tim Burgess is ready to say he actually likes one of his band's albums.

From the playback pod of the Charlatans' new studio, Big Mushroom, deep in the Cheshire countryside, Burgess reminisced about the first time he and his bandmates gathered there to listen to Us and Us Only.

"We've finally made our first really complete album," he said, glowing. "At the playback, none of us were embarrassed by anything on it. We were just proud together. We know it's a good record."

This time, the Charlatans seem to have shed the "baggy" label applied to them and their fellow Manchester bands Happy Mondays and the Stone Roses.

It also seems they've made a record that will secure their place in rock history. The frequently voted "Most Fanciable Man in Britain," now 33 — and still with the unblemished skin of a 22-year-old and the unassuming, gentle demeanor of a Zen master — won't actually say that, though.

"For the first time with one of our records, I'm engrossed from start to finish," said the band's drummer, Jonny Brookes, who added with characteristic northern England deference, "Apparently that's the sign of a good record."

Us and Us Only, released in October, is also something of a miracle record. For a while, it looked unlikely that the Charlatans could summon the strength to rise again from the latest blow fate had dealt them.

After eight years of struggles against personal crises and being written off by the press, the band awoke July 22, 1996, to the news that keyboard player Rob Collins had been killed in a car crash.

Collins was not only the joker in the pack, the guy who kept the laughter going when tempers were fraying. He also was, arguably, the major presence on the Charlatans' records. His thuggish, spiraling Hammond organ marked the band from its contemporaries like the sun marks itself from the sky.

The self-produced Us and Us Only is the result of the two years of mourning and self-examination that followed. It is also, the band hopes, the dawn of a new age for the Charlatans.

"We knew it would be tough, but we couldn't stop," guitarist Mark Collins — not related to Rob — said. "We weren't 100 percent happy with anything we'd done, so we had to do more."

In those two years, they built their studio — partly named for Big Pink, where The Band lived and recorded in the late 1960s, signed to a major label (Universal) and, most important, found themselves a new keyboard player with not only a genuine passion for his Hammond and Wurlitzer, but also a spirit of optimism and gaiety.

Burgess likened the effect of keyboardist Tony Rogers to that of guitarist Ron Wood on the Rolling Stones in the '70s. "He was a savior," Burgess said.

Us and Us Only, which Burgess described as "a shout of solidarity," also may be the Charlatans' long-term salvation. It sounds like the clarion call of a band that has rid itself of old ghosts, freed itself from giving a damn what people think and staking a claim for an entry in rock 'n' roll history books — not merely a line in the paragraph about Manchester in the late '80s.

"I know my star is the brightest star," Burgess sings on the first track, "Forever" (RealAudio excerpt), quickly setting the agenda.

Throughout the album, the Charlatans seem to be polishing up the great jewels of rock's past and transforming them into their particular brand of '90s English rock. "Impossible" (RealAudio excerpt), with its lilting harmonica and mellow vocal whine is almost a paean to Bob Dylan's "Simple Twist of Fate." "A House Is Not a Home" (RealAudio excerpt) takes a Band guitar riff and runs with it until Burgess is out of breath.

The album's center is almost traditional, acknowledging the heralded pioneers of various genres, but its edges are spiky, even eccentric.

"We talked about the songs that got us through certain parts of our lives or made us feel like jumping up and down or made us cry — that's what we wanted to make," Burgess said. "You have to go pretty deep down into yourself."

In "The Blonde Waltz," British pop's onetime most eligible bachelor conjures a fantasy family, complete with an adoring son. That's just one example of Burgess' increasing propensity for frank personal confession. "You don't have to restrict yourself," he said, shaking his head. "At all."