Everybody's favourite purveyors of alternative rock in a David Bowie-meets-Sonic Youth kind of way are coming back soon - Placebo have been working on their sixth and-as-yet-untitled studio album with producer David Bottrill (Tool, Silverchair, dEUS) and engineer James Brown (who also worked on Placebo's fifth album Meds) at a studio in Toronto, Canada. This will be the first Placebo album since the depature of drummer Steve Hewitt; former Evaline member Steve Forrest has taken his place behind the kit on a full-time basis.

A studio feed featuring a selection of photographs from the sessions can be found here. There is currently no word on a possible release date, but an early/mid-2009 release is feasible.

In other Placebo-related news, Brian Molko is to appear at a concert in Paris celebrating the release of Serge Gainsbourg's Histoire de Melody Nelson. The concert is a reprisal of an event at London's Barbican Theatre in 2006, which saw Jean-Claude Vannier conduct and guest vocals from Jarvis Cocker, Brigitte Fontaine (who will also feature in this year's performance) and Mick Harvey from Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, amongst others.