BE honest – Snow Patrol were always your guilty little secret. Chasing Cars was the most played song of the last decade, but confessing to a penchant for Gary Lightbody’s anthemic indie fare is as big a musical crime as admitting you like JLS.

Lightbody seems almost embarrassed by his musical heritage these days and in Tired Pony he is trying to move as far away as possible. While this side-project hardly qualifies as a super-group, Lightbody has put some stellar names together.

Top of the pile is REM’s Peter Buck and his distinctive guitar light up this piece. You might not be sure what “Nashville tuned acoustic guitar” actually constitutes but, whatever it is, Buck’s work sounds amazing on the two highlights – the single Dead American Writers and That Silver Necklace.

Belle & Sebastian drummer Richard Coburn, along with legendary producer Jacknife Lee, also get in on the act, and there is a superb vocal contribution from Editors’ Tom Smith on The Good Book.

The Place We Ran From clearly aims to be a slice of Americana, and there is much to recommend, particularly with Lightbody’s efforts to understate his distinctive vocal.

But here lies the difficulty. For however you wrap them up, this still sounds like Snow Patrol. Just without the clashing drums and the wall of electric guitars.