At one point in time this album was my ‘Number one favourite album of all time’. The reason I can’t really call it my ‘Number one favourite album of all time’ any more is due to Mansun’s follow up ‘Six’ which I love equally, along with the passing of time allowing me to appreciate other albums I couldn’t be without – all vying for ‘top position’. If there is one such album that I would casually say was my ‘favourite album of all time’ though, I’d probably say this one.

Mansun's Attack of the Grey Lantern

Attack of the Grey Lantern was Mansun’s début album, arriving on the tail end of the britpop era in 1997. While it had some similarities, overall it was different to mainstream britpop, challenging, bizarre in places, full of melody and atmosphere in equal parts. When I listen today, it’s a very melodic pop/rock album, with a dark side and a depth usually missing from comparative band’s albums of the time. It had a vague hint of the early 1980′s pop I had been such a fan of as a child, plenty of synthesizers mixed with guitars also played a part in shaping the future of the sound of my own music (Spacehotel).

The album opens and closes with melancholy strings, on the way to it’s climax the album swerves through heavy guitars, drum loops, falsetto vocals, overdriven vocals, sarcastic and wistful lyrics… it’s quite a journey.

Back in 1997 this album was the soundtrack to my life, and for as long as I live it will never be out of it. The Band split in the early 2000s, gone too soon.

Attack of the Grey Lantern is set for a remastered reissue 3 CD set (including all the brilliant EP tracks for the same era) in June 2010, I urge you to give it a listen. Then check out Paul Draper (the lead singer/main songwriter of Mansun who is in the process of recording solo material) at his official website (www.pauldraper.info). You can also read the Q&A I did with Paul Draper in 2007 at draperview.com