FORMED in Dunfermline in 1977, The Skids became one of the most popular bands of the post-punk era with the anthemic guitar riffs and chanted choruses of hits like Into The Valley, The Saints are Coming (later covered by U2 and Green Day) and Sweet Suburbia, ensuring regular appearances on Top of the Pops and a dedicated fanbase of angry young men.

Led by larger than life and vocalist Richard Jobson and the brilliant guitarist Stuart Adamson, the band split in 1982, leaving Richard to become a regular face on TV throughout the 80s and 90s and Adamson enjoy even bigger success with the band Big Country.

Last year saw Skids reform (but drop the 'The') for their 40th anniversary with the subsequent sell out tour persuading Richard and founder member Bill Simpson to go back on the road with a gig at Chester Live Rooms later this month one of eight across the UK.

"It's been a crazy 2018," says Richard, who now lives in Berlin and has recently published both his memoirs and his first novel. "If you'd have told me last year that I'd have a novel, biography and an album out simultaneously as well as touring I would have said you'd gone mad, but I'm not complaining I can assure you of that."

With last year's dates rejuvenating the group's passion, the band entered the studio to record new material. The resulting fifth album, Burning Cities, was issued at the beginning of 2018.

"People were curious and somewhat sceptical, but nonetheless we gave it a chance and then people realised we were giving it an energy that has been absent from a lot of the bands of our generation who have reformed," says Richard.

"I've seen a lot of those bands and I admired them in the day but I get the feeling that some of them were just going through the motions a bit. We've not done that - it's a full blown experience and that's how we wanted it to be because to make it work for us we had to give it everything."

Produced by Killing Joke bassist Youth, whose credits include the Verve and Primal Scream, Burning Cities surprised many by crashing into the top 40, leaving Richard certain that the band were right to give it another go.

"The key was making new music," he says. "The only way to make it relevant was to prove that we still had something to stay. We can't force people to listen to it but for the sake of our own integrity and making this journey have some kind of meaning other than a nostalgia trip was to try something. It's kinda worked - it's not for me to say how good it is but I know the energy that comes out of the album is definitely in the same frame as The Skids towards the end.

"In 1981 we were at our peak - we were playing Hammersmith Odeon and all the big venues and selling them out when we decided to call it a day - not many bands do that. We stopped when we were flying high and we've picked up from there - we're just 35 years older."

Richard, 57, has described Skids as being about "truth and revolution" and with their early songs full of punk rock protest has much changed?

"I expected for the sake of my kids that the world around us would have got a lot better, but in fact it's got a lot harder for them," he bristles. "You look back at the 70s, which were really horrific, as halcyon years now because who would want to be a young person in Britain today? It's tough and we have a Government who don't care about them or their views and old people voting for Brexit with no thought for young people's future.

"Most young people who voted, voted to remain in Europe because they understand the values of Europe are beyond sovereignty and economics and more about about a sense of community. Now they're being dictated to by idealogical lunatics who think they're irrelevant and are taking us back to a nostalgic Britain which is just bonkers.

"There's plenty to be angry about and it was important that we made an album that reflected that - I've never been a person who wrote love songs or a person that was a shoegazer. The words and music had to smash you in the face and we've tired to do that again."

Richard, who was still just 17 when Skids recorded their first Top of the Pops appearance, admits he was a handful as a teenager with his epilepsy further complicating a difficult upbringing.

"I had a bad health condition and it gave me a very bleak view of the world," he says. "I didn't think I was going to be around for long so I was quite feral and angry and slightly psychopathic as a teenager. Seeing The Skids live was a physical experience and that's how we've always approached it. In those formative years a combination of things led me to being that kind of frontman rather than more introverted. There were lots of them about and we never went that way."

Richard's autobiography, Into The Valley, deals with the singer's relationship with former bandmate Adamson which he suggests was partly ruined by his own behaviour. Adamson, who battled alcohol addiction, was found hanged in a Hawaiian hotel room in 2001, aged 43.

"It was nice to dwell on the memories of how we grew up together," says Richard. "He was very generous and helpful to me and the book is very honest about how we went in separate directions.

"Stuart was a guy who was always in search of 'a home' - he wanted a domestic life, with a mortgage, a wife and children. I was the opposite and was full of a sense of grabbing each day as it came because I might not be around tomorrow. We became very different animals - when we were on tour he'd just want to get back home whereas I didn't want to stop because I had nothing to go back to. It was a completely different outlook on life - Stuart was looking for calm and he was never going to get that with a person like me beside him.

"I was aware that he had dark things in his past because he told me but The Skids were never a band who indulged in drugs or alcohol. When I found out Stuart had a massive issue with alcohol I was shocked because I hadn't seen him for a few years and my memory of him was that I don't think I ever even saw him drunk in the years we were together.

"The darkness was obviously haunting him but in the book I try to be honest about the fractures in our friendship and I take a lot of the responsibility for that myself. I was too anarchic to deal with but the day I was told he had committed suicide and the way he had done it was quite a shock because that wasn't the Stuart I knew."

Not content with his career as a rock star, a TV presenter, a film director and now a novelist (Speed of Life is described as a "part sci-fi thriller, part love letter to David Bowie"), Richard is mapping out a future combining the lot.

"It's probably been the most productive year of my life," he adds. "My first novel coming out is tremendously exciting and something I've dreamed of doing since I was a kid.

"The big surprise next year is that we're going to go out and play an acoustic tour and release an album in that style. Most of our songs come at you 100mph but when you take a step back it gives the words a chance - they're different arrangements but they really work. A lot of bands just keep playing and playing but we're not going to exploit the fanbase - we want to offer up something different."

Into the Valley is published by Wymer Publishing, £19.99. Speed of Life is published by Unbound, £9.99. Burning Cities is out now and Skids play Chester Live Rooms on Thursday, June 21.