Former Mansun singer Paul Draper has announced plans for a solo EP and posted a new single online.
‘Feeling My Heart Run Slow’, which you can listen to below, is taken from his forthcoming ‘EP One’, which is released on Kscope on June 10.
It is Draper’s first material since 2004’s posthumous Mansun album ‘Kleptomania’. The track was first revealed at a Mansun Convention at The Live Rooms in the band’s hometown of Chester in August 2014. The convention also featured Q&A sessions, displays of instruments, unseen archive footage, the first airing of previously unreleased tracks and displays of rare photos from the EMI archive.
He said at the time: “I’d originally planned on recording a solo album called ‘Spooky Action’ after Mansun split but shelved it as I wasn’t in a place personally that I could make music at the time. However, the recording session went so well that we decided to do a second recording session and I loved playing so much with my new band that I’m putting together a whole album of these songs now. We’ve got on a real roll in the studio.”
Draper added that the new song is “partially electronic and partially rock”. “I wrote the lyrics a while back when I was in a dark place and it’s all about how you feel when you hit the worst place you can ever hit. But now I’m in a good place, so it’s a bit scary hearing myself sing these pretty dark words finally, and it’s also a bit daunting letting people hear these songs after so much speculation about me releasing a solo record. I’ve done it now though, so I just hope the fans who have kept the legacy of Mansun alive for so long like it and that I don’t let them down. I’m shocked myself that people still love the band so passionately. I gave everything to that band, and it makes it feel like it was worth it now.”
Other tracks on the EP include ‘No Ideas’, ‘The Silence Is Deafening’ and a remix by the Twilight Sad of his new single.
Mansun released three studio albums – ‘Attack Of The Grey Lantern’ (1997), ‘Six’ (1998) and ‘Little Kix’ (2000) – before they split in 2003. ‘Kleptomania’ followed in 2004 after the band’s demise.