In July 1986, Drummond had announced his resignation from his position as an A&R man at record labelWEA, citing that he was nearly 33.3 years old, and that it was "time for a revolution in my life. There is a mountain to climb the hard way, and I want tosee the worldfrom the top... ". His first move was to record and release The Man, and an accompanying spoken-word diatribe "The Manager's Speech". In an interview in December 1990, Drummond recalled spending half a million pounds at WEA on the band Brilliant—for whom he envisioned massive worldwide success—only for them to completely flop. "At that point I thought 'What am I doing this for?' and I got out. I did an album myself, wrote the songs in five days, recorded it in five days, and put it out on Creation Records". Creation's founder, Alan McGee, named The Man his 5th favourite LP: "Bill's my pal, but I thought his record would be crap. He gave a cassette to me and I didn't play it for ages. Then I put it on when I was in the bath one night—I nearly drowned. I laughed for about half an hour. It's the work of a complete nutter". Drummond intended to focus on writing books once The Man had been issued but, as he recalled in 1990, "That only lasted three months, until I had an idea for a record and got dragged back into it all". Calling upon Brilliant's former guitarist Jimmy Cauty, Drummond formed The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu with whom he was to amass considerable fame and fortune until—in 1992—the cycle repeated itself and he quit the business once again.
Songs
During the recording of the album, Drummond was assisted by members of the bands The Triffids and Voice of the Beehive. In the sardonic "Julian Cope Is Dead", Drummond outlined his fantasy of shooting the Teardrop Explodes frontman in the head to ensure the band's early demise and subsequent legendary status. The song could be seen as a reply to the Cope song "Bill Drummond Said". Bill Drummond is a self-confessed fan of Scottish football clubQueen of the South. "Queen of the South" is also the title of the 6th track on "The man". The song is an instrumental.
Reviews
Awarding the album five stars, Sounds called it a "touching if idiosyncratic biographical statement" and a "work of humble genius: the best kind". Q Magazine gave the album four stars and described it as "a curious and hugely enjoyable set that trips from Tennessee twang to fake Scottish folk music to brash little pop tunes" whose lyrics "encapsulate bizarrely sage ruminations on life, marriage, rock'n'roll and the sundry pop stars whose destinies have entwined with his own". In a retrospective career summary review, Ira Robbins of Trouser Press referred to the album as "tastefully understated".
Track listing
All songs written by Bill Drummond except "Going Back" and "Such a Parcel of Rogues in a Nation".
