Richard Ashcroft Returns With United Nations of Sound

With the dust from the Verve's third split finally settled, the band's former frontman Richard Ashcroft has confirmed that he is to return to the public eye with new band, United Nations of Sound, this spring.

Speaking to NME.com, Ashcroft revealed that the name of his new album is 'Redemption' and that knob-twiddling duties had been taken up by producer No ID who'd previously worked on Jay-Z's singles 'D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune)' and 'Run This Town' while the mixing will be handled once again by Chris Potter,

The album marks the first new material from the singer since his former alma mater, the Verve, re-united after an absence of eight years and released their fourth album, the punningly entitled, 'Forth'. However, despite the success of the album and headlining sets at 2008's Glastonbury and V festivals, the band were soon at loggerheads and their split -- their third in a tumultuous history -- was confirmed in August 2009.

Since then, the Verve's Nick McCabe and bassist Simon Jones have joined forces with electric violinist Davide Rossi and drummer Mig Schillace to form the Black Ships.