Mike Skinner has mused on the demise of his decade long project The Streets.
It shouldn't end like this. The Streets have long since fallen from their critically esteemed pedestal, with their new album 'Computers And Blues' being greeted with near unanimous apathy.
But The Streets' introductory blast of material is as influential as anything British music produced in the Noughties. 'Original Pirate Material' remains a stunning achievement, blending garage beats with a sublime lyrical sense.
Deciding to end the project, Mike Skinner insisted that he only ever wanted to do The Streets for ten years. Cranking out five albums, the Birmingham songwriter has revealed that he is simply running out of areas to explore under that title.
"It's obvious. I've been doing it for 10 years and I've always tried to do something different with each album," he told The Guardian. "Some (of my work has) been amazingly received and some of it hasn't been, and I've run out of new avenues."
Continuing, Mike Skinner explained that The Streets simply do not interest him as much any more. "As uninteresting as the Streets is to talk about, the most interesting element of anything is its death, so if you're going to talk about the Streets, ending the Streets is probably a good thing to talk about," he continued.
"But it's not interesting really. I haven't really got anything more to do."
The five album plan, it seems, suited the economics of the situation. "This album is not really a new direction. It's all the directions I've already been down rehashed into something that's… quite nice on the ears" he said.
"I signed a five-album deal, so the economics of the Streets really shaped it as much as my inspiration," explained. "It would be silly to end the Streets on the fourth album and then make another just to satisfy a deal, or to do six albums and do five of them on Warner and one of them independently."
"So it's part of the economics of my business and part of getting to that point."