Plain White T's Planning Foreign Conquest

Global domination and making a new album are on the docket for chart-topping pop-rock band Plain  White T’s in 2008.Currently opening for Fall Out Boy, the Chicago quintet plans to head overseas in January to promote the recent international release of its “new” album, 2006’s “Every Second  Counts.” The group will play the U.K., Europe, Australia, New  Zealand and Japan, according to frontman Tom Higgenson.”We’re possibly bigger in the U.K. than we are in America now,” Higgenson told Billboard.com. “It’s still fresh over there. We’re going over to headline 2,000-seaters, which will be great.”But Higgenson and company are even more excited to start work on their next album. He says the group has “about 17 ideas; eight or nine of them are pretty much full songs so far.As soon as we get a few days off I’ll try to finish the rest of them.”Higgenson also plans to keep writing and hopes to have “a good 25, 30 songs for the album” by the time Plain White T’s hit the studio.As for the new material’s direction, he says the success of the Hot 100 singles chart champ “Hey There Delilah” — originally on the group’s 2005 album “All That We Needed” and included as a bonus track on “Every Second Counts” — has certainly had an impact.”We’ve always had acoustic songs on our albums,” Higgenson notes. “Those are some of my favorite songs to write and some of the band’s best songs. Now that ‘Delilah’ was so successful, we won’t be as afraid to include a few more of those on the next album. I definitely think there will be some more acoustic stuff… and the rockin’ stuff will be more rockin’ than it’s ever been.”But, Higgenson adds, he’s not worried about typecasting  Plain White T’s as a ballad band.”Not all our songs are like that,” he says. “Before  ‘Delilah’ we had ‘Hate’ on the radio. It didn’t do as well but was still out there. People heard the song and heard ‘Delilah;’ hopefully they’ll connect the two — ‘Oh, that’s the band that did that other song.’ But we’re just making good songs. You have to make music you like and hope it gets out there — that’s all.”