He decides to christen his debut solo album “Simple”.

Simple?

Nothing has ever been simple with Andy Yorke.

Not his decision to walk away from a major label music career – twice.

Not his years of self-imposed exile in Russia, determined never to pick up a guitar again.

Certainly not the fact that, however reluctantly, he found broken relationships and personal demons still driving him to write songs that demanded to be heard.

The journey to his eagerly awaited debut – the album that almost never was – has been anything but straight-forward.

However, along the way a collection of songs has emerged which are beautifully simple. And often, simply beautiful.

Andy Yorke, a genuine heart-on-sleeve singer-songwriter, walked away from his band in 2000 and swore never to get involved in music again. Music, he says, had stopped being fun, become “relentlessly unhappy.” His songs had always been melancholy, but “somewhere the beauty disappeared and it became angry.”

A reluctant frontman, this was the second time he left the band. He initially quit on the eve of their first big break, a publishing deal with Zomba Music. Both times he left for Moscow.

Russia has long been the other obsession in Andy’s life. He started learning the language when he was 12, studied it at university and worked as a translator for Greenpeace. It’s where he sought solace when things got too complicated. After years spent battling between the lures of Russia and music, by 2002 Russia seemed to have won.

Five years on, Andy found himself with this collection of songs. Tracks he had begun writing as a long-term relationship was ending. “The songs were me trying to help and feel better about everything. I was writing in spite of myself. They were therapy and by the end of it things were starting to sort themselves out in my life.”

It makes for a poignant, personal collection. There are songs on the album about being desperately lost, not knowing you’ll ever find the way out: “The idea that someone you are in a relationship with knows the answers, isn’t lost, knows the way out – but can’t help you.” Songs like Twist Of The Knife and Ode To A Friend.

Songs of someone desperately trying to make sense of things and somehow find salvation: “At times I looked to religion – and discovered how weird and crazy and vengeful the Old Testament is.” Songs like Surrender and Diamant.

And songs of discovery: “The first track, Simple, would be at the end chronologically. After a long time trying to think my way out of the depression I was in, finally realizing things can be straightforward. It is a love song as well.”

Simple is an album about emerging from the remnants of a broken relationship. About finding yourself. But it’s also the compelling sound of a man falling back in love with music again.

Recording for the first time under his own name, Andy has laid himself bare: “I thought it was important. I didn’t want to go by a band name. It is different, now it is just 100% me and my songs.”

Even this isn’t so simple. Andy has never wanted to invite questions about and references to his brother Thom. But he smiles, “I still see there are potential problems going by the name Andy Yorke. But fuck it, it’s my name.”

Same name, but this is a very different Andy Yorke.

His work is still stripped-back, acoustic and emotional. The album bears these tags like the quieter half of Neil Young’s After The Gold Rush, Ryan Adams’ Heartbreaker, Elliott Smith, Gillian Welch, early REM or Low.

But the new album has been rightly described as a glass half full.

Andy agrees: “With some of the songs this time I was dancing around the room with excitement. Like when I wrote Simple, One In A Million and Rise And Fall.”

He’s back playing live too: “I used to hide from fans at gigs – but I am much better this time around. I am grateful and appreciative and much more confident.”

“I always had this idea of my life being very profound, very interesting and different to everyone else’s,” Andy admits. “But life becomes easier when you realize it is the same very basic things that make everyone happy.”

“So many things that once seemed complicated now appear simple,” he says. “The album is about this happening in all kinds of ways.”

Finally, everything makes sense. Beautifully simple. And simply beautiful.