“Definitely not. I think they’re f...... awful most of the time. And there was definitely trepidation about releasing this record. Solo record. We’d say it as such a derogatory kind of thing within the band. But it just worked out that I had a couple of weeks off and that’s what I did. I think that when you’re on a good thing you should really stick to it, it’s just that in the middle of last year we weren’t really sure whether we still had something together. There just seemed to be so many frustrating things going on with You Am I preventing us from just getting on with what we do.”

So this was recorded around a period of uncertainty with the band. Did it clear your h ead in any way? Did it make things more certain?

“I don’t know. Things pretty much worked themselves out with the band around the time of making it, and afterwards. This wasn’t something I had to get off my chest, a statement I’ve been wanting to make; it was sort of what I did on my holidays, really.”

So this is not something you dreamt of doing when you were a kid and now you’ve got to release your magnum opus.

“No. Certainly not. All I wanted to do when I was a kid was just be in a band. To make a record by myself was just an opportunity that came up. I’d been touring in a working rock band for nearly all of the year, and maybe I just wanted to do something that didn’t involve shouting. I had these songs there. With You Am I we do a number of more subtle things with each record and always have, I just had so many of the songs around that were like that. I thought I’d like different instrumentation. What Russ, Andy and I are best at is thumpin’ but they can play as subtle as hell those boys. I hope I was appreciating what they do fully.”

Have they heard it?

“Yeah, they’ve heard little bits. They were there for the mixing. They’d drop on in. They were really encouraging.”

What if anything determined the sorting of these songs for this album and perhaps a new You Am I album?

“I cleared the well for #4 Record [the last You Am I release]. I made up my mind I wanted to do this kind of record and then just started writing in the first half of last year. When I finished that I started writing for the next You Am I record. I don’t really have a big catalogue of songs laying around.”

Geoffrey Weiss’ wonderful liner notes suggest that ‘‘these songs don’t remind me of any other music,’’ yet the fiddle and the upright bass and the pedal steel suggest a country feel. Do you listen to country music?

“I don’t go searching. I like John Prine, Kristofferson, and a couple of the bigger names, your Williams and your Nelsons. Little bits. If it’s good. I think there are a number of indie rock bands that think that they can make country sounding records and I think time will show the dire, crap ones from ones with any worth. There’s something simple and heartfelt about country music that people just grab hold of.”

What about the label ‘country rock’ which these days is even more unfashionable than ‘country music.’ Is that any closer to they type of music on What Rhymes with Girls and Cars?

“I don’t know. I think there’s a lot of dreadful music released in the last couple of years under that country rock thing. I really don’t know. I just hear it as being folk chords with some extra instrumentation. I don’t think there’s too much country in it. There’s maybe something in the instrumentation and some of the lyrical themes that could be deemed that way, but I think it’s just folk chords with flourishes.”

There’s a wonderful swing and sway to the performances on the album. All the best intentions and a heap of skilled players can get into a studio and sound like they’re playing in straitjackets. What was the secret to getting the great feel?

“Get ‘em drunk.”

This is an alcohol album?

“Absolutely. There was a great pub just next door so...”

How did you select and then pull together The Twin Set?

“Well, Jen (Anderson) suggested people. After a day of doing some guitar and vocals we’d go out and see some bands, just for a drink, just to see these people who were excellent musicians. I’d think ‘I wonder if they’d be interested in adding their clarinet or washboard or whatever to the record,’ and just asking them. Matter of fact, like that, friendly. Go and have a bottle of lambrusco and see what happens. It was not very planned. We’d just laid down the guitar and fiddle and then just pulled in folks from all over the place.”

STEPHEN ANDREW