NINE EP
Being A Girl (Part One)

Railings 
Been Here Before 
Hideout 
Wide Open Space (Trouser Enthusiasts Remix) 
I,Care 
Mansun's Only Acoustic Song
 
6 b-sides are included in the EP over three formats. CD1 has Hideout, a track of pretty indecipherable lyrics (wrote by Stove!) wrapped around a hauntingly dark guitars with a bubbly light backing with laughter and synthesizers. Next comes Railings, wrote and co-sung by ex-Buzzcock Howard De Voto. With lots of wierd sounding guitars at the same time breaking down repeatadly to piano, it seems strangely hollow. CD2 has the brilliant I Care with fast gently mumbled verses and and majestically big chorus' alternating well - a good track of the old Mansun mould. Shockingly the subject for the song seems to sadism & sex - with lines like 'I want to get fucked like a whore in a porno' this would never have been allowed as an a-side! Finally on the CDs we have Been Here Before, a track which begins not unlike Negative live with screamingly noisy guitars, but has a nice Face In The Crowd feel to the backing. Paul gives us a glimpse of his lovely talented voice here - look forward to more of this in Inverse Midas on the album.

The band also released two rare tracks (on cassette), an acoustic version of Mansuns Only Love Song cunningly renamed, and a popular (in dance circles) remix of 'Wide Open Space'. Neither particuarly impressed me to be honest, though the acoustic tracks are now much better than the early attempts. Anyway it's probably the last we'll see of those last two tracks/periods, so I suppose it's a nice way to tie it all up and leave them behind.

The lead track is be Being A Girl (Part One), the first two minute (yes, it's that short) part of the final track on the new album (the album version being nearly five times that length, and in two distinctly different parts). The track is definitely the wierdest a-side ever, with a Police drum-beat, rapid and unpredictable volume changes, and the structure breaks down half-way through revelaing a tinkling little 'Ice Cream van' type tune.

'Being A Girl' has sparked the age old Mansun question about the band's sexuality, but Chad bizarrely denies gender comes into the issue: "It's just about wanting to be different; basically it could have been about being anything. It could have been horse," (to Paul,) "in fact, in the original lyrics it actually was horse-" Paul interrupts: "'I feel like being a horse?' You didn't tell me that!"

The title track had it's first play on Radio 1 by Steve Lamacq on 20 July. The band played it again on the 'Lamacq Live' show (27 July) at Maida Vale studios, plus other new tracks. The highlights are in the Downloads section. The EP was released on August 24th.