He also wanted their music to break away from the mid-paced mainstream indie played by the likes of Radiohead, Travis and Starsailor. “We wanted ours to be smaller and spikier,” Skelly explains. Broudie had a vision and “added colour”.

Nick Power gives some examples of the songwriting process. The chords for the song Calendars and Clocks were taken from Frank Sinatra’s It Was A Very Good Year. The band added a Morricone-like interlude, complete with spaghetti western style ‘Ooh-Ahh’s. But its Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young-esque harmonies meant that, despite the cornucopia of influences, the song ended up sounding like no-one but The Coral. The chords for Shadows Fall, meanwhile, were influenced by veteran US vocal group The Mills Brothers. Those who believe that a band’s place of origin defines their sound should look no further than The Coral. You can hear Liverpool in their music: there are clear influences of skiffle music, Merseybeat, and The La’s. But Hoylake is halfway between Liverpool and Wales. So you can also detect the quirky psychedelia of Super Furry Animals and Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci.

The band had plenty of fun at the studio. A famous reality TV star at the time was Rik Waller, who’d recently appeared on ITV’s Pop Idol. “We used to have this thing called Waller Watch,” says Skelly. “Wherever you were, if Rik Waller came on the telly – because he was on the telly all the time – everyone had to run up to a certain room. Even when we were doing a take, which I imagine would have done Broudie’s head in.” And what was the punishment for whoever came last? “I think they got the last go on the spliff or something.”

Ah yes. The spliff. There was plenty of that too, as their producer remembers. “It was like, you’ve got a bunch of kids from Hoylake and they’re all into that hydroponic weed, or whatever it is, and usually they can’t afford to get any and suddenly they’ve got a budget to all have their own spliff,” says Broudie. “I remember saying to the engineer, ‘I’m going to have to get a check-up. I get to the end of the day and I can’t think straight. I’m usually a bit more insightful.’ He was laughing and he said, ‘You’re off your tree. They’ve all been sitting smoking weed around you.’ And I said, ‘Is that what it is?’ I hadn’t smoked weed for years.” He’d leave the studio “zonked”.

There was one bone of contention. The band were reluctant to record the song Dreaming of You. The doo-wop track with the earworm chorus was deemed to be a touch safe, perhaps a little too poppy, and excuses were made not to record it. But Broudie knew it could be a career milestone. “I had to make them go back to the studio under duress. It was quite funny. I remember them saying, ‘We can’t record it. Paul [Duffy, bass player] has got earache, we’ve got to go back to Hoylake,’” says Broudie. Dreaming of You went on to sell 600,000 copies and remains The Coral’s signature song. “It’s more famous than the band, which is the way we’d like it,” says Skelly today. “Not that many people have a song in the public consciousness.”