PREVIOUS solo albums by former Blur guitarist Graham Coxon were almost the sound of a man apologising for having once been in the charts.

Their wilfully lo-fi home production, eccentric musical experimentation, funnily-morose lyrics and a general air of having been recorded in the prolific Mr Coxon's potting shed with not the slightest regard for commercial success, certainly explained why he had been so unhappy bashing out Damon Albarn's chirpy Mockney ditties for a living.

But now, Coxon seems to have suddenly rediscovered a hunger for the spotlight - his fifth solo record sees him thrashing through a set of spiky punk and whimsical English pop that sounds like prime early Blur.

Forget potting-shed production and sulking into a tape recorder - Stephen Street is back behind the mixing desk, and Coxon even sounds confident as a singer. In fact there's barely a duff song, a phrase never previously seen in combination with the phrase "Graham Coxon solo record".

There's the joyously throwaway guitar blow outs of Freakin' Out and Spectacular, the gleefully spiteful folk pop of No Good Time and Bittersweet Bundle Of Misery, and the melodramatic 1960s flourishes of Are You Ready, while People Of The Earth finds him in full Seventies rock mode.

I'm not so sure about the blues parody Girl Done Gone - but it's largely an excuse for Coxon to blow off steam with some fretboard-mangling soloing, so is a forgivable indulgence.

Happiness In Magazines is the likeable sound of a man genuinely enjoying his new-found freedom. The shy, complex and troubled Graham Coxon is having fun at last.

Updated: 10:03 Thursday, May 13, 2004