A bizarre pseudo rap about a transvestite vicar who cross dresses like his daughter, it seemed a good idea at the time and slightly subversive but seems a little tame by today’s standards where such things are pretty run of the mill. Written in the form of a letter from the transvestite vicar to his daughter, it sort of deepens the plot of the album’s narrative a bit before it’s all resolved on the final track, Dark Mavis.

Panopticon is definitely their best album in my opinion, but the rest of their discography is worth a listen (in particular the almost equally fantastic Oceanic album).

He kept a record of the original vocal that is now being released on the outtakes CD and listening back he was right. Can someone create a new listing for this one please as I care not interfere in official Discogs entries, sorry ? I remember being slightly off my tits in Ibiza when Paul Oakenfold’s remix came on in Pacha and it blew me away. Having spent my formative years going to [nightclubs] Cream in Liverpool and the Hacienda in Manchester, this really ignited my love for dance music, and ‘Egg Shaped Fred’ was one of our early tracks where we’d jam our distorted guitars over drum loops from an AKAI S900 sampler. Mansun are regarded as one of the most innovative British bands of the late 1990s and released three classic albums - Attack Of The Grey Lantern (1997), Six (1998), Little Kix (2000) - a retrospective compilation Kleptomania and a popular series of EPs during its existence.

Having been a huge dance music fan it was really satisfying having a big club hit remix from the album too. The audio has been fully remastered from the original master tapes by long-time Mansun collaborator P-Dub (Björk). Although this song sat neatly with the narrative of the plot, I thought I’d challenge my own rule on this song, I remember the chorus being really emotional, and it still feels like that now.This song leaves you with the sentiment of not taking the whole thing too seriously, it’s just a bit of a joke. There aren't that many metal artists or albums that I care for that much, but ISIS is certainly a band that I do enjoy a lot.

The Kscope label has acquired the band's impressive catalogue and are creating a deluxe reissue series that delves into a treasure trove of previously unreleased audio and visual material.

This was going to be the big single after the album was released to turn us into a huge pop group, but for some reason or another (everyone has a different story) it wasn’t released and ‘Taxloss’ was put out instead. Each Mansun album started and ended with the same style of track, something I thought I’d be able to continue through all our records, so they became like a journey from start to finish.

I was planning ahead and already had the idea of a skit on a concept record already written down, this song does what it says on the tin and describes a particularly debauched night in the life of the characters on the record. At the start of the recording sessions for the album I’d decided there would be no love songs on this album, or any Mansun album. Listening back to the lyrics I’m reeling off characters from the fictitious small northern town where the album is set, ‘Skinima Nosebreak’ ‘Fatima Toothpaste’ ‘Penelope Cheapskate’ ‘Claudia Farmgate’, not your average lyric for the era really and still makes me chuckle to this day that something so absurd hit No. With former Mansun frontman Paul Draper now enjoying a solo career after a number of years in the wilderness, his old band’s debut has been re-released in a special 21-year anniversary edition. This was the earliest song I wrote for the album, you can tell from the lyric it’s from an earlier, more naive me.Attack of the Grey Lantern is the debut album by English alternative rock band Mansun released on 17 February 1997 via Parlophone.