Alex Turner – Submarine.

Arctic Monkeys are probably the only ‘Web 2.0’ music success not funded on the QT by the established industry - I’m looking at you Sandi Thom - and became a phenomenon by sticking to their guns and writing eloquently in language with mass-market appeal; having the best drummer in many a year didn’t hurt either! Alex Turner and Miles Kane’s nascent super-group The Last Shadow Puppets 2008 effort The Age of the Understatement was an intriguing hybrid of his inimitable vocal styling and John Barry arrangements. After the slightly disappointing & over-produced Humbug, and squeezing in just ahead of the forthcoming Suck It and See, comes another side project, this one solo.

Submarine is the directorial movie debut of IT Crowd’s Richard Ayoade. It’s an 80s-set comedy-drama, based on the novel by Joe Dunthorne, concerning a 15 year-old’s attempts to lose his virginity while simultaneously saving his parents’ marriage. Turner has written the soundtrack… so far, so ‘Badly Drawn Boy’s About a Boy’.

What we have here is a short collection: 6 titles (although the opener is a 50 second preview of Stuck on the Puzzle, so 5½ songs may be more accurate), making it a - what? EP? Mini-album? Albumette? Whatever it is, it signifies a departure from his previous work; not exactly ground-breaking, but surprisingly wistful.

After the intro (piano & acoustic guitar refrain with a short, almost whispered verse) the set opens properly with Hiding Tonight. It’s hard not to think of fellow Sheffield cove Richard Hawley here; the lyrics remain firmly in familiar Turner territory (“I’ll know the way back if you know the way”), but the vocal delivery is restrained, understated and really rather lovely. Glass in the Park continues in the same vein: a great gentle melody delivering a paean to young love with minimal accompaniment.

It's Hard to Get Around the Wind is voice, acoustic guitar and typical Turner wordsmithery: “It’s like you’re trying to get to Heaven in a hurry and the queue is shorter than you thought it’d be and the doorman says ‘you need to get a wristband’” – which is then wonderfully rhymed with “quicksand”. Penultimate track Stuck on the Puzzle is a reverse-reprise of the opener, broadens the sound out to a more familiar band feel and is a real highlight. Piledriver Waltz is the most musically and lyrically complex track here, with shifts in the time signature and allusions to “breakfast at the Heartbreak Hotel" where "your waitress was miserable and so was your food".

All in all this is a really strong collection well worth investigation; in particular, Turner’s vocals are tuneful, melodic and well suited to this change of pace for him. I’m looking forward to seeing how these excellent songs play in the context of the film.

Submarine is now available as a CD, 10” vinyl or download from the usual outlets.