James Franco releases preview of new Smiths-inspired album with band Daddy

Rolling Stone has described the teaser as a 'hazy grooving track'

US actor, writer, artist and musician James Franco (Getty Images)

First he successfully dabbled in short story writing and now, James Franco has released a preview of his first album with new band Daddy.

The Hollywood actor, 36, started the group with his producer/composer friend Tim O'Keefe and their debut, Let Me Get What I Want, might just be a hit with music critics when it drops next year.

Comparisons have already been drawn with The Smiths, somewhat inevitably as bassist Andy Rourke from the original Eighties band plays on almost every song.

Then there are the lyrics – all taken from Franco's poem collection, "Poems Inspired By Smiths Songs".

"The Smiths' songs provided inspiration for the poems, lending tone and situation," Franco told Vice. "Once I had the sequence, Tim and I took the material one step further and turned the poems inspired by songs, back into songs of their own."

The preview is titled "This Charming Man" but despite sharing a name with The Smiths' famous track, it sounds very different, with Rolling Stone describing it as a "hazy, grooving track spliced with swirling post-punk guitar lines"

Each song from the album will be accompanied by a short film, with each film following the same characters so as to make a longer project too.

"Daddy investigates the territories of film/video, installation and performance while simultaneously exploring the connections that form between them," reads the group's 'artist statement'.

The icing on this James Franco cake comes in the form of paintings he created in art school featuring in every video. We get James, you're a creative guy.