ODLUDEK is a Polish word, meaning loner, pilgrim, traveller or hermit.

Given Jimi Goodwin's career path so far, always being part of a band, it's the perfect name for the album that sees him finally going it alone.

"I'm doing this on my own, without my safety net of collaborators, Jez and Andy," he says. "This album was all down to me, my gut and my hunches. I've made a record that I wanted to hear."

Jez and Andy are the Williams brothers, schoolmates-turned-bandmates of Goodwin's, first during their time as Manchester's premier post-acid house chart botherers Sub Sub - you'll know their 1993 hit Ain't No Love, Ain't No Use - and later in Doves.

The future of the latter band is still not clear. The official line is they haven't, and won't, split up, but there are no plans to reconvene. The Williams brothers are also currently working on an album together.

Based on things Goodwin says, it sounds as if the making of Doves' fourth album Kingdom Of Rust was so draining, with the trio working on it every day for three years, they each decided it was time to try something else.

"Jez and Andy are my brothers, and Kingdom Of Rust was a fitting record to make before pressing the pause button on Doves for a bit. There's every chance there'll be another Doves' record, I just don't know when."

Odludek, then, as you might expect from Doves' principal songwriter and singer, isn't a million miles away from the band's past work.

While songs such as Didsbury Girl, Keep My Soul In Song and Ghost Of The Empties - his ode to the abandoned buildings in the Ancoats area of Manchester - are reminiscent of Doves, there's enough on the album to show Goodwin has broken new ground.

Oh! Whiskey, for example, is as playful as he's ever sounded, beginning with a campfire-style singalong before three minutes in striding off into an almost balletic, piano-led second half.

"It's autobiographical, that one," he says of the song, a warning to himself about the dangers of drinking.

"I have to mind my manners with it, or I did do for a while. Let's just say that I had to stop and take stock."

"It's a precautionary song, about mood-altering substances in general; how you don't have to have drink to be creative.

Goodwin recently supported his friends Elbow on their UK tour, and heads out on the road again next month. The set will largely be made up of new songs, although there will be a couple of older tunes for the fans still wanting to hear Doves' tracks.

"Odludek is like my fantasy record, and I'm so proud of it," Goodwin adds. "I'm not going to be evasive about that or hide away from the fact. I really like this album and I've said everything I wanted to."

l Jimi Goodwin, King Tut's Wah Wah Hut, May 10