Singer-songwriter Gavin Rossdale, bassist Dave Parsons, drummer Robin Goodridge and guitarist Nigel Pulsford decided to make their latest album, Golden State, a back-to-basics record after the studio experimentation of The Science of Things.

"We wanted to try more studio stuff on the last album. This album, we wanted to make an album that sounded great live," Parsons says. "Some of (Science) worked really well live, but there were other songs that were much harder, much more studio effects.

"We try to approach each album slightly differently. We've never tried to repeat something we've done before. That would be a mistake -- 'Oh, they like that.' So we've never done another song like Swallowed or The Chemicals Between."

Early on, some critics dismissed Bush as a put-together band poised to cash in on the rise of grunge in the early '90s. But it's a decade down the road now, and Bush is still together and has continued doing albums its way. There's a lot to be said for hanging in there, Parsons says.

"You do know each other's playing inside out. You know when to back off or when to be loud, when to build, when to be quiet," Parsons says. "We've always had a good dynamic, especially live. It's something you learn together. With the hired-hand thing, you can find it very sterile sometimes. Playing in a band a long time gives you an edge."

Parsons is no stranger to bad reviews, having been in the critically reviled Sham 69 and Transvision Vamp before Bush's formation a decade ago. Have the members noticed the shift in critical response, which has cast them as something of alternative elder statesmen?

"I have, actually," Parsons says. "It's funny. There are certain things that are still the same, but there has been a general shift. The criticisms that were leveled against us have been proved wrong. We've outlived all that. It's funny -- almost by outliving it, you become the band that people compare other bands to."

They ignored the media, good and bad, for the most part anyway.

"I'm as suspicious of criticism as I am of acclaim," Parson says. "Though it's nice to have a little bit of acclaim. We've always been quite honest about our music. There's been no cynicism to it."

Despite their hits and relative longevity, Bush has been rocked by the changes that have occurred in the record industry over the past decade.

"We've never had it easy in that respect," Parsons says. "There seem to be so many bands, ... there's so much music. So it's harder to get heard. The boom of alternative radio seemed fantastic; then this commercialism crept in and they had to play what people told them to play.

"Music has become like all other business. There are a lot of entrepreneurs in music now; they think, 'Oh, we'll just make a band.' It's not a way to make money or be famous. It should be an art."