Singer Paul Heaton has told The Diary that he’s patching over his differences with a former Beautiful South bandmate especially for his Manchester International Festival performance.

Over a pint (of blackcurrant and soda) in his local pub in south Manchester, he told The Diary that he got back in touch with vocalist Jacqui Abbott, who sang on the band’s huge hits Rotterdam and Perfect 10, on  Facebook one night after a few beers.

He asked her if she wanted to sing one of the eight sections of his new musical for MIF, The 8th, and she agreed.

Jacqui is one of seven singers Paul has hand-picked to sing his ‘song in eight movements’ – each movement based around one of the deadly sins, plus one surprise extra that Paul has created.

Joining Jacqui and Paul on stage will by Cherry Ghost’s Simon Aldred, Yvonne Shelton from the Longsight-based gospel Sing-Out Project, Scottish songwriters Kenny Anderson and Aaron Wright, country singer Mike Greaves and new discovery Wayne Gidden.

Paul will sing the final movement – but he’s keeping the nature of the new eighth sin under his hat. And he says he’d even like to perform a duet with Jacqui in the show’s second half, which will be a selection of Paul Heaton hits.

Star of The Wire, Reg E Cathey (who plays political campaign manager Norman Wilson in the popular TV series) will be the narrator, tying the musical movements together and he is currently working with internationally celebrated playwright Che Walker on the script.

The music has been written with Paul’s long term musical collaborator Jonny Lexus and the pair are  working above a pub in Salford with a five piece band and The Owl Ensemble string section to put the finishing touches to the songs.

Paul told The Diary that The 8th is also the first song he has written in Manchester for morte than 25 years.

He said: “I’ve always written away from home; Holland and Belgium in the middle of winter for the lyrics and Tenerife skipping on the balcony for the music.

Lyrics about terrible Britain soundtracked in the heat of Spain! This is pretty home-grown in Withington. It’s the first lyrics I’ve written at home since 1986.”

But as the festival approaches, Paul says he’s still struggling to summarise what the The 8th is. “My problem is I’m not very good at selling myself,” he laughs.

“Not like Damon Albarn; no disrespect to him, but if Damon Albarn had written it, he’d have called it an opera. As it is, I can’t say I’ve written an opera. So it’s a rock gospel. A popera. I don’t really know; you can call it an opera, you could call it a musical, but there’s no dancing or acting.”

» The 8th is at the MIF Festival Pavilion from July 7-9. For tickets, see mif.co.uk

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