You Have Not Heard

NEWSFLASH! Folking Facists?

2009-10-23T17:13:00.013+01:00

OUTRAGE TONIGHT AS 'CHUDKINS TELLS BBC TO 'GO FOLK ITSELF'

You may remember that we featured a group by the name of Patch Chudkins as our second-ever band You Have Not Heard? Well, it seems that fears that our little trio were a little on the wrong side of right have proved probably founded, maybe.

Following growing discontent amongst Stephen Fry that the band were in fact a musical front for the English KKK - BBC's Watchdog program launched an undercover expose on the the two surviving members of the band - Guthrie and Ruth Archibold. In an unparalleled act of cunning Watchdog stalwart Matt Allwright dressed up as a tree and surprised the pair at a National Front meeting in June. The group claim that Allwright was sent as a BBC lynch mob to bring the pair's career to an end over comments on camera regarding unsaid, unfounded and unproven truths (that were unprovenly unfounded and true). It has to be said that Allwright did not help the situation by appearing with a noose hanging from one of his branches. However, the expose brought an end to any likely comeback for the pair and came mere weeks after Guthrie's release from prison on licence. The band were due to release their next album in 2010 (working title - "Heading Through the GriffinDoor").

Late last night and apparently in protest of Allwright's handiwork, the pair stormed into television centre demanding air time. One of the Dimbleby brothers, we cannot be sure which one at this stage, with the help of Jeremy Paxo, took them on in a two versus two, melee, tag team, cage fight showdown. We believe the Paxo-Dimbleby combo dispatched of both Archibold's, ending with a piledriver that caused Weather presenter Daniel Corbett to wet himself live on News24.

The pair are currently being questioned by Police but are expected to make an official complaint against the BBC. The basis of the complaint is thought to centre around things they said that were true but have since become untrue, unsaid and slightly more acceptable in the public eye.

The trial continues.

#41- Nightwear

2009-09-20T09:36:00.006+01:00

Some people would regard this as a footnote, but we're interested in different stories to most people. In his otherwise forgettable book "The Outer Rim of Bohemia" Joe Grayshot described one night at the edge-of-the-city-centre apartment complex he lived at:

"I was fumbling about on the settee, trying to move the remains of my speedball to flick the channel over. I didn't want to go all John Belushi but my head was fried and I needed to get away from Newsnight Review. Movement was not on the agenda. Bonnie Greer was shouting some spat about mother nature being a hobo in the Garden of Eden, I was trying to respond but she wasn't listening. The TV was -I had to remind myself- a one way device. A method for putting ideas in your head. A platform. I eventually made it to bed.

"There was to be no rock'n'roll in my room that night. Fisticuffs were off the agenda and I wouldn't try to sneak them in under AOB. But upstairs the Silentnight due, Senor Hippo and Ms Bird were going at it hell for imperial leather. They certainly weren't coming up clean."

Well, that kind of nonsensical Gonzo approach to writing certainly had it's fans at one point. Mainly people who thought writing involved vomiting on the nearest page and physically attacking anyone who dares to criticise them. But our concern is that Grayshot had inadvertently spoken about our next band, the next band you have not heard of: Nightwear.

It has to be admitted at this point that Bill MacGregor was not a thin man, nor was his then girlfriend overly large in any direction. Grayshot's snide remark was accurate, if hyperbolic. MacGregor was not one to take offence, especially as he has fashioned a whole career on sleepytime music.

As Nightwear, MacGregor detuned his otherwise well-tuned guitar and strummed gently to himself. The studio made him produce his own records as the engineers kept falling asleep. Perched on the edge of a rocking chair, guitar in one hand and mixing desk in the other, fat squelching out of all remaining crevices on the seat, MacGregor produced the kind of music whales would produce if they knew their "song" sent you to sleep. He had no time for reverse reverb or any tremelo nonsense. No. He favoured open chords on a an acoustic, with whispered lyrics about drinking Horlicks neatly fit into the background. Some say that MacGregor was capable of hypnosis; something he states is not only untrue, but offensive to real hypnotists who not only send people to sleep but also get them to pretend to be cats, think they are themselves aged 8 and stop smoking.

After two albums and a guest appearance on In The Night Garden, MacGregor was approached by a the makers of a branded promethazine. Testing on his music had suggested to them that it released a weak dopamine antagonist into the system, thus causing a lack of awakedness. His music was running them out of business. They told him they would either pay him to develop his music under laboratory conditions or would kill him. Sensing that Big-Pharma could probably get away with murder he decided to take the lab job.

A lab job is not as sexy as it sounds. We'd all like to work in a hair-dryer factory so when asked about the job we could say "Well, it's a blow job." Or indeed work in a household waste sorting site so we could say "It's a rubbish job!". Or indeed be an intern for Sandra Day O'Connor so we could say "It's a day job!". But "it's a lab job!" only works if you also breed large dogs and MacGregor lived in an inner rim apartment where dogs were banned, along with cats, rats, bats and smoking. It never stopped Grayshotbut that's because he's just the type of person who feels that rules don't apply to them. MacGregor, on the other hand, determinedly and studiously tried to experiment with his music and sleep patterns, discovering amongst other things that tube amps are a decent way of producing sleepytime happiness for all around. He also discovered that Barry White is not the thing to think about if you want to go straight to sleep. Conference followed conference and MacGregor had less time for his real passion of recording music that sent people to dreamyland. Eventually the company cracked his magic and he was released to make music once more.

Set free from his pharmaceutical captivity, MacGregor decided that Nightwear should enter an "insomniac phase". MacGregor and his supporters tried to stay up for a whole week in order to get really very tired. This allows them hallucinogenic experiences and also allowed fo rthem to experience the world as someone so permanently close to sleep. The resulting album "Why the heck did I do this to mysef" went straight to number 1 in the "Music for people with problems" chart, pushing OCD favourite Bo Anders Persson to number 2 for the first time in quite some time.

Confident in his legacy, both chemical and muscial, MacGregor now sleeps quitely at home with his short, thin, yellow wife. Joe Grayshot plans to punch different celebrities at book signings until they all give up and go home.

#40 The Great Grandfathers of Invention

2009-09-07T19:10:00.008+01:00

We all remember the moment, July 7 2007, 19.42pm. The world watched the ad break of Coronation Street.

A smartly dressed but somewhat dishevelled looking Michael Barrymore came into view. He looked as if to speak, but he stopped himself, descending back into his own thoughts. Rousing his character he turned to the camera and began:

"Viewers, compatriots, [painful sigh] friends. I feel that I have a huge apology to make. I have shamed myself and am only now coming to the realisation for for years I have laboured under a very fundamental mistake. A known mistake. Something I should have admitted to earlier. I am truly sorry.

"For it appears that a hot spot is indeed a good spot. A hot spot can make your life a little bit better. So when you're in town next, do a search, find a hot spot and check the news, send some e-mails, watch Man to Man with Dean Learner. A hot spot is a good spot. A hot spot is. A. Good. Spot. I'm only sorry to have misled my people for so long."

Cut to black and, whilst audible sighs and sobs can still be heard in the background, the logo of TB Open Zone appears.

When the rioting ended and calm returned, many people realised how much modern society had descended into a pure stream of advertisements. Some took to consumerism, but Matthew Willows took to the past. Previously a member of the Velvet Trenchcoat Mafia, Willows decided to leave the world of 2 for 1 subculture and adopt a healthy 3 for 1 subculture instead.

The idea was steamprog. Previous media had made the steampunk sub-subgenre partially encompassing. The steampunk pioneers were interesting in making the mid to late Victorian period alive with the wonders of technology not as boring drawings and schematics but living, revolutionary concepts and machines that belched thick fog, made nasty noises and frequently blew apart. Often these machines and concepts had little grounding in fact or reality. Willows had no time for that.

Willows's aims was to create a band that was interested in boring drawings and schematics. He was interested in the way things worked and how that affected our everyday lives. He was a weird guy. The first songs he wrote focused on the way a cone lock nut is shaped after being tapped to create a helpful torque which is required to keep an engine together under high heat. In three songs he explained the engineering relationship from the point of view of the nut itself, the grease covered engine driver suffering under the pain of exposure to heat and haemorrhoids and the drivers mother, unable to claim assistance under The Poor Law Amendment Act, frittering away her lazy afternoons watching smoke trails on the horizon. The first song started with a small crack in the nut ("I think I'm cracking up, I think I'm going to spin out of control"), the last song ended with the engineer noticing and removing the nut ("ashes to ashes, carbon steel alloy to carbon steel alloy.") . The liner notes make clear that the nut now resides in the National Railway Museum in York, alongside a Beeching-era closure poster and a hip flash with GWR etched into it.

Willows himself compared the three song cycle to the realistic literature experiments of Emile Zola. Being dead, Zola could not comment but his family threatened to sue the pants off anyone caught comparing themselves favourably to their great granddad. Besides, the relatives said, nobody ended up dying in a painful and harrowing way, so it could not be anything like the work of the master himself.

Releasing the three songs as an self-issued EP, Willows had played all the instruments, done all of his own accounting and even acted as a groupie on more than occasion. When the requests for gigs started coming in, Willows decided to pull a band together. Eschewing the tradition of getting band members who can play instruments, Willows decided instead to hire people who looked the part and tried to teach them rudimentary instrumental skills in the weeks leading up the first gigs. To find a bunch of bearded train enthusiasts was not exactly the hard part. An ad in one of their journals of repute was enough to have two hundred fame-hungry, pie hungry, mutton chopped wannabe train drivers banging down Willow's door. The selection process was gruelling. Each contestant had to answer questions from one of the hardest tests known to man. At the end of the heat stages Willows asked the remaining steamers to compete in an eliminator challenge. John Fashanu was taken away for the important hosting duties on Deal or No Deal Nigeria to present and the whole thing was shown on Puff, the new UKTV network for men aged 45-90.

Eventually the band were chosen and Willows had to teach them some instruments. The washboard was easy and Cecil Parkin took to it nice and easy. Jack Skinner was given the harder task of playing Willows's cheap knockoff of Yuri Landman's Moodswinger. Let's just say he hit the instrument on occasion and no-one complained. Harry Lambert, the 'looker' of the group was given the ceremonial role of 'contributing to overall musical direction.' He also promised to cut himself on stage if anyone asked whether he was serious about his art. Nobody did. Whilst on stage he strummed a guitar that was not plugged into an amp and until the fifth gig was still had its cellophane pick guard protector on. Mr Orkindale rounded the line-up by trying to hit some drums. Denied drumsticks by Willows following a painful accident in practise, Orkindale took to slapping the drums and producing snare sounds by gently tapping the skin and side of the drum.

An early Willows-free performance on Later with Jools Holland did nothing to limit their reputation as acolytes and when a washed-up Willows finally decided to leave the band (following Lambert's serial womanising hitting the front of the Daily Record ("Fishwives! lock up your mothers!")) the band decided to carry on without the only person who could, you know, play music. Unsurprisingly, the music they produced was out of tune, out of key, in no particular time signature and the lyrics make increasingly less sense. They are currently supporting Sonic Youth.

Michael Barrymore is currently managing the internet advertising strategy for Mishka.

#39- Silver Showers

2009-08-30T09:36:00.007+01:00

Fame! You don't get to live forever, you don't get to learn how to fly. Of all the famous people who have ever tried to fly, only Robert Fripp has managed to do it with any degree of regularity. Some say he's actually a parrot, some say that he's a jackdaw, yet more say he's got a rocket tied to his back. It's actually a combination of all three.

But Fame, for all the broken promises about lighter than air travel, is also a harsh mistress. A mistress who wants you to leave your wife for them, a mistress who purposely leaves lipstick marks on your shirt, a mistress who turns up expecting Christmas dinner with your in-laws. And when Fame finally gets tired of waiting for you to bump off the missus, she leaves town and forces you to try and cobble together a life without her.

Fame played her part in the story we are about to tell, for Ken Mills had his run around the block with the dark force of celebrity. He played bass guitar in the critically and commercially successful band Citizen and Mrs Smith. You don't need us to tell you that Citizen and Mrs Smith made 17 prized albums of low-rate indie pap, or that they sold out so many stadiums they eventually decided to build their own, or that they fell out with each other about who should have the last sherbet dib dab, with charges for affray considered and then dropped.

But Ken Mills was not the brains of the operation, was not the public frontman, was not nothing of any note. What should he do? He had just enough money from the performing rights to disappear into the hills whilst working on a new album, but what should that album be about?

Since he was a child Ken had two all consuming interests: travelling and excessive cleanliness. Whilst touring with Citizen and Mrs Smith Ken kept a detailed diary of every hotel shower he used. He regularly commented on a shower's flow, force, temperature control, speed for water arrive, cleanliness of the head (of the shower), cleanliness of the head (of the show user after exiting the shower), ability to contain water without it going on other bathroom items, ease of use of the controls and overall experience. From this he normally calculated a qualitative outcome ranging from "Chemical Shower" -a disappointing experience with no redeeming features- to "Silver Shower" -the best of all worlds and possibly some good shampoo thrown into the bargain. Between these extremes were Copper Shower, Bronze Shower, Iron Shower, Platinum Shower and Crest Shower.

Retreating to the hills, Mills filled and killed his time trying to work on a new album by typing up his shower ratings. Eventually either a stroke of genius, a stroke of madness or a plain old fashioned ischemic stroke made Mills realise that he could combine his bass based song writing with his reviews of the world's showers. Mills set to work setting music to his words and trying to wrangle the whole thing into the album which eventually became called "April Showers Bring May Flowers". Of course you have not heard of it, that's why we're putting it on this site. Mills took to using the nom de plume Silver Showers to make sure his work is not overcast by his history and previous band.

There are two standout tracks on the album, the first being "Bad Times at the Blackpool Arms" which details one of Mill's first experiences on tour:

"Perhaps I told you wrong,
I said I wanted to stay in Blackpool,
Not stand in a pooling pool of Black,
Black as your heart, you dirty old bat,
I rate you Copper Shower!"

The second standout track and a crowd pleaser at Mills's gigs is the heart (and skin) warming "Holy Royd Hotel, Edinburgh". Mills is often found clambering on his speaker stack to sing the rousing final verse of the song:

"If I could rate you golden, I'm pretty sure I would,
But that's just sick and wrong so you're a
Silver Shower and should,
go down in human history, as the best of the best of the best,
and best of all, in the freebies bag, you even give me a vest."

For this reason almost all of Silver Showers' gigs happen in Edinburgh.

Perhaps you're thinking "why doesn't Mills drench his audience with water at the end of the gig, in some sort of literal interpretation of his muse?" Mills has considered this but decided that if he did throw water on people he couldn't guarantee the quality of the experience night after night.

"I don't want to become everything I've railed against" he told melody maker. Amen to that, clean brother.

#38 The Famous Minnows

2009-08-13T22:20:00.214+01:00

Who ate all the pies? Who ate, who ate, who ate, who ate, who ate all the pies? A question I often ponder when going to the fridge to discover my last Balti Chicken and Onion has gone. But what has that got to do with bands you have never heard of? And who's this handsome fellow on the right there? Is he single?

Well, being on the cusp of the new football season has gotten us all a little dewy eyed over those classic football songs you always used to hear. We're not just talking about the ones on the terraces - 'You're going home in a Chelsea Ambulance' and the like. But also the perennial, biannual and deciduous outings that remind us just what it means to be a football fan. Even if you are not a fan, these songs really do transend the beautiful game. So many lie forgotten in the vaults and record collections of devoted fans up and down the country. You will, however, be pleased to know that we have had a whip round in the office (half of us can no longer afford to got to the the Christmas meal). That's right, we bought the rights to all of them and plan on unleashing them on the unsuspecting public (that's you. Although I suppose you may have an inkling what we have planned, seeing as I just told you).

Such classics we now own include:

Up the Millwall (The Bashing 'Em on the Noggin Song)
Morcambe, We Saw, We Conquered
You Only Win When You're Scoring
We're Fat and We Know, You Know We Are
Wiggy Wiggy Wiggy Wiggy Wigan
My Favourite Meat is Tottenham

Did you know, it's not just New Order keeping the 'World in Motion' when it comes to bands recording foorball ditties, oh no. Can you believe it - there are bands that make a living out of this stuff. That brings us neatly to our next band that You Have Not Heard...

Does anyone remember what happened to those two lads off the 'Accrington Stanley - Who are they? Milk advert'? Of course yes you do probably not. Let me fill you in. Accrington Stanley made a triumphant return to proper football in 1995. Before that they spent twenty years trying to sell their own brand of the game with three goals and multiball release everytime someone called Trevor, Michael or Beverly took a corner. In their first season back in the league they were unable to fulfill the full quota of games for a season (on account of an incident involving an errant llama and club mascot Fraser the Eagle in the final game of the season). Interestingly, they did win best dressed at the football league awards. In the same year the two lads from the ad, now 21, unleashed their musical talents on the world. By an unfortuante turn of events the ten years supply of milk that they had be given as payment for the ad made them as rotund as a swedish meatball, and possibly twice as wide. Despite Ian Rush's saged advice in the advert, this was not enough to even secure them a place on the bench at Accrington. Even the llama could have managed that.

Randall Tamworth III and Jimmy Spillikins named their band after Accrington Stanley's nickname - The Famous Minnows. Believe it or not only one of the pair was actually from Liverpool. The other was a RSC trained child actor. It is on record that he didn't so much see as lowering himself to do the part, but saw it as a valuable character study - another box to tick on his CV (Hamlet- yes, Iago - yes, Scouse child fond of milk - yes). Yet another string to his bow! So fine were his talents that, to this day, no one knows which of the two was the real scouser.

Off the back of the success of the advert the pair released a remix version, which included an Ian Rush rap. You've seen John Barnes rap, you've even seen Tom Hanks and Dan Aykroyd (RIP) rap. Rush, however, is something special - "I'm Rushy, quite pushy but I'm nice, I'll giggle if you say titmice'. The video is an abolute classic and featured Bruce Grobbelaar on drums.

The lads acted as freelance football songwriters in the nineties, penning songs for everyone from Arbroath to Motherwell to Inverness Calywotsit Thistlers. Their tunes quickly became crowd favourites, and their biggest hit is still sung to this day at grounds around the county. They turned 'He's Got the Whole World In His Hands' by God into an anti-United rant for Manchester City fans. 'He's Got Steve Bruce In His Pants' shot in at 19 in the charts back in 1997. "His got Alex Ferguson doing his dishes, he's got Peter Schmeichel feeding his fishes, He's got Cantona behind the bar, He's got Steve Bruce in his pants". Truely. Social history in action there.

To this day Ian Rush finds himself beaten to within an inch of his moustache by understandably irate Stanley fans. Meanwhile, the rest of us keep on downing the milk in the vain hope that we won't be forced to don the Accrington kit and play a half or two. I swear there are 90 year old grannies who live in fear that one day they will get that call from Fraser the Eagle asking them to play. It's some sort of sick national service. Anyhoo, the band have promised they will only pen another song when Accrignton win the cup. Until then they will remain in obscurity, a fading memory of a nation which forgets them and their contribution to football...

You know, my mum used to say that when I grow up I might be good enough to play in The Famous Minnows.

The Famous Minnows? I used to quip. Who are they?

Exactly.

Newsflash! Love Music, Love the NHS

2009-08-13T19:06:00.004+01:00

Here at YHNH, we hate our health system being besmirched by the "progressive right" from the former colonies. In the old days, we'd be able to settle this sedition using painfully high taxes, low representation and -if needs be- a spoon-based approach to heart surgery that other empires would consider ill judged.

But no more. Now those upstart Yankee Doodles can make all manner of nonsense up about our healthcare. Recent claims include:

Doctors operate an "opt-out" system for punching unconscious patients when they enter wards,
Older people are often left overnight on the A361 near Rose Ash to save space for bureaucrat's empty cardboard boxes,
The giblets that come in Christmas turkeys are from left over cadavers from the Royal Isle of Wight NHS Trust,
Simon Cowell trained as a death panel bureaucrat before giving that up to be on TV,
Hamsters are frequently left to complete difficult procedures on patients as all the real doctors are happy-slapping frontbench cabinet ministers,
People called Neil are seen before people called Simon,
The Ear, Nose and Throat Department have a very clear policy on what they stick up your ear, nose and throat, and it isn't a small camera,
Clement Atlee preferred an insurance based approach to healthcare, but was shouted down by "invested interests" such as poor people and lepers.

We are not going to stand for this filth anymore. Join us at Rhyl this Saturday to protest at gross inaccuracies in the current American reporting of the NHS; we will be protesting by cranking up some amps and dancing like vibrating blueberries. Bands signed up to play include Bypassing Wind, Honey Munster, Hullaballoon, and Frank Bottlebin. Frank may or may not bring his legendary "inflatable pet spider diagram" Alan the Spider.

Be there and be proud of the NHS! Stand up for your right to be treated free at the point of consumption! Don't smoke too close to Alan, he pops really easily!

#37 Daniel's B! A! N! D!

2009-08-02T09:15:00.006+01:00

Here at You Have not Heard, we love a good sing song, especially when we get to sing about "sausages and jazz". Sometimes we even watch Songs of Praise, confident in the knowledge that there will be no devotional call to cause embarrassment, confusion or accidental conversion. Our next musical excursion takes us deep into the world of "popular" Christian music. There is no moral, we just like making stuff up.

There's absolutely no way Tamworth should be in Staffordshire. Staffordshire is to the North and West of Birmingham but it is definitely, definitely not to the East. But there we go, apparently it is in Staffordshire and there's nothing a pointless blog writer like me can do anything about it. Anyway, the Comberford Baptist Church had a problem. Too many young people were not going to Church but still writing "Christian" on their census forms. We find that all good Christian stories start with a census. The head office in London wanted to know why Comberford did not have it's requisite parishioners in the all-important 18-34 age bracket. They were dangerously close to missing target BVPI 2287: "10% of all self-defining Christians worshipping at the local Baptist Church." Failure to meet that could easily lead to a shortfall in funding or a pull-no-punches letter from the relevant minister. The Church needed bums on cushions on pews.

Their first solution was a Christian Puppet show. That failed. Then they went for Christian Mime Artists. That failed. Big time. Then they thought, screw it, we'll just have a worship band.

The Church approached the one person they thought they could trust with a worship band, Daniel Danielson. Daniel was a Icelandic national and a postgraduate student in music technology at the University of Sutton Coldfield. He could tell the difference between Jars of Clay and Smalltown Poets. Honestly. Not even Dan Haseltine gets it right most of the time. On appointing, anointing and anodizing him, the Church felt secure that he would boost membership by at least 300%. Not in their wildest dreams could they understand what happened next.

Danielson started by forming his band from anybody nearby who could play an instrument and was happy going to Church with slightly messed up, gelled hair. Tobias Tobin came onboard as rhythm drummer, Kurt Knut (real name Curtis Dairyland) played lead drums and Honey Vienetta joined Danielson in playing guitar and singing close harmony. Danielson took all the high notes because he thought Titus 2:5 gave him that power.

Their catchy, drum heavy version of hymnal classics certainly got the local youth going. Before long, the band was managing to pull in the entire East Midlands under 25s to the Church. You heard me right, East Midlands, because East Midlanders know that Tamworth is with them, and not the "strangers to the North". It was such a success that The Pope considered turning up. This idea was only quashed when it was realised that Baptists and The Roman Catholic Church have not exactly seen eye to eye for many years. With success and fame on so many levels and at one such time, where should the band go next?

The band went to the seaside, which considering Tamworth is roughly the most landlocked place in England was certainly a leftfield position. Hiring the whole of Pontins, Pakefield and scheduling coaches from Tamworth, Leicester, Loughborough, Nuneaton and Upper Bruntingthorpe the band took their fans away for a weekend billed as "devotional retreat and challenge." Did they fulfill this? Did they heck. The weekend was a full on music festival where Daniel and his band had "curated" the other bands playing. The list included such "Christian rock luminaries" as Shellac, Los Campesinos, Battles and Alan Vega. Daniel's B! A! N! D! played their headline set each individually wearing a t-shirt that had either "B!", "A!", "N!" or "D!" on it and rocked out using their eponymous song to a devastating noise rock conclusion. Purists and the delegation from Comberford questioned whether Daniel was really celebrating the Old Testament servant and prophet Daniel. They thought it was much more likely that Daniel was celebrating himself and the "purpose true" was really just his fame and his fortune.

At the end of the weekend, the band stated that they will be moving on from the West Midlands in order to "capture the hearts" of the rest of central England. After successful forays into Herefordshire and Gloucestershire (including a mega-weekend at Barry Island), the band tried to crack the difficult nut that was Worcestershire. After partial success in St Johns, and the ensuing encampment overnight preparing to cross the Severn and take Worcester, this campaign ended abruptly when a reconnaissance mission consisting of Danileson and Knut were run over by Michael Malone just outside of the West Midlands Safari Park. In Malone's defence, he stated that he "really did love that car." Anyway, without any legs or a lead drummer Danielson felt he couldn't continue. We find that all good Christian stories end with a death.

Without Danielson the band folded and the youth fell away fom the Churches, lured out by Steve Albini's frenzied attempts to appear at every seaside festival ever, including those in the past and T4 on the Beach.

#36 Queen

2009-07-29T19:39:00.100+01:00

We come across alot of things in the process of writing this compendium, this encyclopedic virtual tome, which we don't very much like. Bands with more than five words in their name, bands that don't cite S-Club Juniors amongst their influences, bands with more than one llama on percussion. Indeed, we may come across as quite angry individuals at times. Individuals who may not really like any music but the sound of their own voices set to a little bit of Chopin. It's not true, but my vocal timbre really does lend itself to the odd minuet. We may get a little wound up at times, but this band really takes the biscuit.

Let me unleash a few of our gripes. They name their albums after their own name, one of them has a perm, one of them is dead, they claim to be related to the royals. Yes, that's right they called themselves Queen. As if that wasn't enough the lead singer has the same surname as a Roman God. I mean, just who did they think they were?

Despite a career that spanned two decades it is only until recently that this previously unknown foursome have come to our attention. We felt it was our job here at You Have Not Heard to warn you, nay, order you not to lend your ears to such atrocities.

Big hair, tight trousers, and a love of astronomy. No, not Patrick Moore, but Queen guitarist Brian 'family-friendly-hair-rocker' May. He built his own guitar at the age of 16 and still uses it to this day. The wood was sourced from the Mary Rose, the frets from Winston Churchill's tooth enamel and the strings woven from the hairs on his very own head. He uses coins instead of plectrums just 'cos he likes the way it feels. Flash git. As if that wasn't enough in 2002 the self-titled guitar virtuoso broke into Buckingham Palace and had the cheek to whip his guitar out once he got to the roof. All this during the Queen's jubilee celebrations! Needless to say Her Majesty was less than impressed and May got what he wanted. Her Majesty's pleasure - three years in Wormwood Scrubs.

The supposedly enigmatic one of the bunch, one Frederick Mercury was also the lead singer, as is so often and disappointingly the case. Originally Fredros Merkeros he was born for the stage. His parents often told him that one day he would have fame, fortune and a moustache. Well, one out of the three wasn't bad - and he finally declared his facial hair masterwork complete on his seventeenth birthday. Fredros, or Freddie to his friends, was incredibly shy and would only play gigs if he was promised three Farley's rusks and the latest copy of Beano (but not Dandy, oh no! Cow Pies?! a little far fetched, he felt). Once he was actually on stage he was a different man. He would generally prance up and down topless, wearing tight shorts and clutching a tiny microphone stand. He spent his whole career trying to save up for the rest of that stand. He never did save enough and died tragically without a microphone stand deserving of both his follically endowed upper lip and the recognition a select few claim he deserved. Upon his death three people grew moustaches in tribute. One, who thought he was a real Queen fan but only started liking them near the end when it look like they might make it, grew a handlebar moustache. Such a faux pas cost him his Queen fan club membership (membership number four). He is now a multi-millionaire future's market investor, but still rues the day his moustache started growing south and reached his chin.

The other two band members are lost in the mists of time but are thought to be John 'the Baptist' Pope and Roy Rogers (later of the cowboy fame). Not even Queenies (Queen fans) can remember their exact names and the pair are never named in the record sleeves (despite May's hair getting two mentions and Mercury's pet chiuaua three).

The band's music can best be described as witty throw-away, take it or leave it rock. Think Whitesnake trying to be funny. Think Europe but slightly less funny. Queen try to work witticisms into their songs on a disturbingly regular basis. They wrote one song about really loving riding your bicycle, one about girls with big bottoms and one about those pictures that look like a pattern until you cross your eyes and then it's a unicorn ('It's a Kind of Magic' - 1986). You don't see THE Queen coming out with comic stuff like that. That's why she has Prince Philip.

I mean, this isn't fricking play school fellas - come play with the big boys! Ever heard of a little band called Monkey David and the Gravy Trainers? They did this kind of thing in the sixties and they made a success of it. All Queen have is obese women's rears. Monkey David used their music and comedic references to expose pressing social problems - in 1965 they exposed the increasing problem of immigration from Hatfield Peveril, Essex into London. In 1968 it was how we were going to deal with the influence of The Beatles on 'young minds' (the answer they proposed was to go back to 1928 and kill Hitler). They answered the questions we were all asking. Queen on the other hand decided to sing about a waking up in a world where, to our horror, every time we tuned into a radio all we would hear is a baby's inane chatter (Radio Gaga 1975). Horrifying, yes. Groundbreaking, probably. A good tune, of course not.

Luckily, no one has heard from Queen since the 'tragic' death of Mercury. Rumours that Ben Elton is actually writing a musical about their life are just too funny to consider.

#35- The Socratic Rhythm Method

2009-07-26T09:21:00.006+01:00

Is Tom Daley Daley Thompson’s son? I fail to see the impotence.

In a world where being related to someone –anyone- is of such importance? Apparently so.

What band are we going to talk about this week? The same band we talk about every week.

The Socratic Rhythm Method? None other.

Why? Why not?

Why not? Why?

Wherefore art thou? Beneath your blummin’ feet.

So what was his method? It started by beating two eggs.

I think you’re playing me? No. He beat boxed two eggs in two rounds.

He was into beat box? You heard me right.

And the eggs didn’t mind? They were glad to be part of the magic.

Whose magic? His. Malone Diaz.

Malone Diaz? None other.

None? Perhaps one.

One? I have it on good authority.

On? On the authority of I who is called I-scream.

Nevertheless, tell us about this Diaz? The man you call Diaz started cooking.

Then what happened? He broke some eggs, spilt some milk, shook up a structure or two.

He didn’t mind slitting a few throats? But he got it.

And what did he do with it? He was going to weigh some flour.

On some scales? Yes, on some oldie-timey counterweight scales.

Did he weigh the flour? He tried to set aside the weights he didn’t need.

But where? Well, he couldn’t find anywhere else.

Where? He had no other choice.

Where, wally? Look, the ends justify the mesnes.

Where? On his Yamaha PSR-185.

On the keys? On the keys and it was on.

The must have sounded bad? Actually, it sounded ok.

What did he do? He started tinkering.

What happened to the cake? It started bakering.

Did he like the sound? Not at first, but he started adding drum patterns.

Drum patterns? Yes, the PSR-185 puts the full power of a backing band behind you with the 100 rhythms and accompaniment styles.

Did he get anywhere? Not until he also added effects and hooked in some midi filters.

So this isn’t just one note for hours and hours? Far from it, he used the keyboard like an audible LFO.

Big deal, didn’t Keith Emerson use a knife to hammer down keys? Doesn’t Greg Lake look wrong in a blue pastel suit?

Ok. Whatever point we have has been proved. What did Diaz do with his record? He hung it out to dry.

Literally or metaphorically? You’ll have to ask him that.

What did he call the record? “The Weight of The Scales of Justice in The Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles.”

Catchy come home? All the way to the piggy bank of Scotland.

Did it win him many followers? Not many, but enough to move from a bedsit.

Where is he now? Studio apartment. Open plan.

City Centre? HMO.

Why did she get involved? Everybody wants their piece of the pie.

Have you got to feed the monkey? It makes it more supine when spanking comes along.

Did he follow it up? You know what, the next year he left his keyboard upside down and went on holiday.

His neighbours? They sold tickets as a voyage of discovery.

Was there a discovery? Yes, that he paid his electricity by coin meter.

We’re all slaves to our condition? No. That those old 5 pence pieces were really, really big.

We’re all slaves to our condition? You’re a slave to your inhibited questions.

Would I be less inhibited if I’d imbibed more palliatives? Probably.

Have you been to see the seaside? I don’t through fear of cerapods.

Not cephalopods? No. They’re easy to beat. Up and left all the way.

Where are we? I think we’re in Basingstoke.

Where is this going? Diaz was going everywhere fast.

Why was that? The electricity company appreciated his and his neighbour’s contribution to their funds.

Whatever did they do? They let him play a gig at their HQ.

Did he sell out? That depends on what you mean.

What do I mean? He set his keyboard up, placed his weights down and went to the pub.

Did they appreciate it? They gave him positive feedback (A+++++++++++++ excellent all the way)

That must be good? It was followed by a retrospective at The Baltic.

The respected centre for contemporary art? Well, kind of.

Kind of? It was in that building.

In Gateshead? Indeed. Whilst it was still a flour mill.

Was there any milling around? What do you think?

I ask the questions here?

#34 Jakesperion

2009-07-19T18:08:00.003+01:00

Arghhhhh! Bands that name themselves after their lead singer! (or rather lead singers that name their band after them). Arghhhh!

To introduce the precedents... Bob Marley and the Wailers -Ole Bob seemingly didn't have a lot of faith in his bandmate's talents. Van Halen - you aren't a Medieval German Prince - get over it. John Butler Trio - yes, there are three of you - woop-de-fricking-do.

And look Jimi Hendrix Experience. If I wanted to 'experience' Jimi Hendrix I would go to his house and pay him to dress up as a chinchilla and dance about singing Lionel Ritchie's 'Hello'. That's how I would experience him. And what happens if I want to 'experience the other members of the band? - I don't even know their names! Oh it makes me mad!

Jakesperion, as you may have guessed are also named after their lead singer, one Mr Jake Sperion. And well, I'll be jiggered - despite their terrible moniker they aren't half bad. In fact I need to clear my throat, as I wish so proclaim - "People of Bridport. Fine people of Bridport. Prepare to be adequately rocked!". (People of nearby Symondsbury may have to wait a few months for these guys to make it down the B3126 to see you. But be ready....be very ready).

In fact I feel I may have cheated you a little in claiming to have just introduced you to Jakesperion. You may well have heard them on the latest advert for eggs. (Not even Jack's Johnson managed to get onto an egg advert). You know the ads I mean - the ones which suggest that eggs are great for you and to eat them or yourconflakes or such like. A full 23.45 seconds of Jakesperion's tune "Full English" appears, as the young star of the ad tucks into the forth egg of his five-a-day quota. (Apparently eating five of something in a day provides significant health benefits. But beware....any more or less than five and you are 0.34% more likely to develop post-natal acne).

I digress.

On the back of their televisual success they were the featured band of the week on MySpace for four weeks in a row. There are also at least two Facebook groups in their honour (see here, and here). Bands who find fame through ads are almost always forgotten in an instant. They may even sell a few thousand albums off the back until people quickly realise that that was the only good song you will ever hear from that artist.Jakesperion may well be different. 'Full English' was a tasty indie dancefloor filler with a twist of satire so witty that it is soon to appear as the Anti-Nazi League rallies. #Don't shave your head, it only encourages them. Don't buy an armband, unless you are in mourning# as the songs bombastic opening encourages.

So who are Jakesperion? Well, Jake is the cheeky lead singer who commands the stage and wage. At the tender age of seventeen he formed a band at Bridport Technical College just to get him through his NVQ in Music Technology in applied Automotive Engineering. The other three band members were handpicked by Jake according to a complex looks:talent ratio calculation. The result isundoubtedly THE most talented band in Dorset. By happy (but unsurprising) coincidence they are also THE sexiest in Dorset. It seems pointless to even mention the other band members. We know you'll just forget them. In fact we know you don't even want us to tell you. Such is the problem with an enigmatic frontman whose band is named after him. The other members wanted to call the band 'The Brian Simon Project'. No one is quite sure (including the band themselves) if any of the group are in fact called Brian or Simon or what their project was, but it sounded good. Jake pointed out that he was the sexiest, talentiest one, so the band should take his name. As there was already a band called 'The Jake Sperion Project' they settled on 'Jakesperion'.

The similarity between the band's name and the word pertaining to the Elizabethan bard is not lost on Jake. The band's debut EP "Jakesperion Tragedies" includes such tracks as 'As You Liked It', 'King Leer', 'Much Ado About Ian'. On first listen it's more of the same anthemic indie disco ditties. Look deeper and you begin to soak up the social dilemmas and stories of gritty real life in Bridport. If you want to know what happens on Bridport Millennium Green every Friday night this disc is a must-listen.

There must be a down side I hear you cry? Well, yes. Jake has developed an annoying habit in interviews of using numbers that just don't exist. Whilst appearing live on Good Morning Bridport he stated that the group would soon play their twenteenth gig, that he hopes to one day be a bermillionnaire and that his age was seventoon and one. He is still young however and has a lot to learn about interview technique. Hopefully the good PR people at 'I'm Not Listening Records' will beat it out of him. Either that or the other zeight band members will.

So, what for the future? The band continue to gig two or three times a night in Bridport and are soon set to play their fiftieth gig at the Red Lion (the pub next to where the old Lidl used to be). Look out for them at the Bridport Fossil Hunters Festival on August 9. You Have Not Heard predicts it will be their last gig before they hit the big time - on 12 August they are due to play Ottery St Mary New Music Festival, just outside Exeter.

These guys are going places - down the A35 to Ottery. Next stop Poole!

Newsflash- Children's Safety Song Announced

2009-07-19T09:30:00.009+01:00

Here at YHNH we are very concerned about the safety of our children. I say "our" children but by that I mean the children of society. We don't really know where children come from, but we hear it is icky and involves travelling to York, Norwich or Lincoln, none of which we particularly want to do.

As people who are deeply interested in the wellbeing of children we are glad to know that a new safety song is winging it's way to all PSE, PSHCE, and sports science co-coordinators at every primary school in the country. Permission has finally been granted by the author to distribute the song and the band created to record it (cunningly named Buffalo Mozzarella) managed to knock it out between Cash in the Attic and Doctors.

In order to improve child safety, we feel it necessary to repeat the words to the song on the site:

"There's something happening here
What it is ain't exactly clear
There's a man with a sign over there
Telling me I got to beware

I think it's time we stop, children, what's that sign?
Everybody look what's going down

There's double lines being drawn
Looking right for every look to left
Young people crossing their roads
Getting so much help, from the crossing guard

I think it's time we stop, hey, what's that sign?
Everybody look what's going down

What a sports-day for the heat
A thousand kids in the street
Singing songs and carrying signs
Mostly say, hooray for our feet

It's time we stop, hey, what's that sign?
Everybody look (twice at) what's going down

Motorcycles strikes deep
Into your chest cavity it will creep
It starts when you're never afraid
You step off the side, the men come and take you away

We better stop, hey, what's that sign?
Everybody look (twice) what's going down
Stop, hey, what's that sign?
Everybody look (twice) what's going down
Stop, now, what's that sign?
Everybody look (three times if necessary) what's going down
Stop, children, what's that sign?
Everybody look (look, then look again) what's going down"

Children will then be given a choice of colouring in a picture of
Albert Camus or writing a short biography of Linda Lovelace,
covering her life's work and eventual demise in 200 words and
up to one picture.

#33 The House of Cards

2009-07-09T19:48:00.042+01:00

...and that is why I don't like arctic roll. Unlike our next band that You Have Not Heard. They love it.

It's 1985 and Ian Michaelson has it all. Model wife. Big House. Fast car.

It's 1996. Ian Michaelson has nothing. No house. Big, fast wife. Model car. His life had come tumbling down like, well, like a tonne of fat-wife-sized dominoes.

What happened in the eleven year intervening period? How did one man go from riches to rags from beef to mutton and from After Eight Mint to just plain Ferrero Rocher? The answer to this and various other mind shatteringly complex questions, lead us to The House of Cards.

Ian Michaelson loved his cards and was a proud member of the Magic Circle (membership number 6384). Michaelson was also a gambler. Not like the amiable gambler in the hit song of the same name by Kenny Rogers. Oh no. Michaelson had no idea when to hold them, let alone when to fold them.

Michaelson was a serious gambler. No nudie decks for him. In fact, he had a ten year stretch of good luck that saw him win big money and celebrity Vegas friends such as NASCAR driver Butch Butchelson, six Tom Jones-alikes and Siegfried, but not Roy (Roy thought he was a bit of a "kuchen-schnitzel"). Everything was going his way until one fateful night in 1995.

The venue - Scarborough Bingodrome ("For all your gamble-tainment needs. We practically roulette you win! There's Casi-No way you can lose, even if your Craps!"). The game was Pontoon or 'Twenty-One'. And you see, for most people the clue to success in this game is in the title - "Twenty-One". Michaelson did not see this and let his vice take over. On the fifth hand of the fifth game Michaelson had a jack and a nine - nineteen for all intents and purpose was a fabulous hand that was certain to beat the paltry hand of the house. He had everything riding on that one hand. His car, his house, the money for his wife's monthly gastric bypass procedure.

Alas, he twisted when he should've stuck. "Hit me!" he declared smugly. The crowd gasped. Four of spades - bust! But he just couldn't take that he had lost. Kenny Rogers was frowning at him whilst simultaneously turning in his grave. "Hit me" Michaelson cried for the tenth time, before being ejected with a score of eighty-six. In the history of mistakes this was something a bit special. It's certainly up there with the time that Napoleon decided to have a swim straight after eating his lunch. In fact this was possibly a worse mistake than when Nick Griffin was invited to appear on hit BBC genealogical TV show 'Who Do You Think You Are?'. It turns out he was wrong all along.

At this, the absolute nadir of his career, Michaelson decided that there was only one sensible course of action - he formed a band with two down-on-their-luck gambling buddies. Michaelson sung and played guitar whilst Ian "Snake Eyes" Jeffers tackled percussion and Babyface Bob the bass. They played comfortable middle-of-the-road country, comfortably and on one or two occasions in the middle of a country road. Imagine The Eagles crossed with Crosby, Stills and Nash and Boston. On acid. Yeah so all those bands just sound like The Eagles but just imagine it - that's what The House of Cards sounded like that is.

It was Michaelson's fine finger-picking style that was the envy of, well, the other band members. Seeing as Babyface only used his thumb to play bass and Snake Eyes could only play the drums, they were both pretty much in awe of his talents. The group lasted only one gig with of more than six people. Their last took place at the Lytham St Annes Hippodome (or 'Dome of Hippos' - the children's funworld, just off the M55). A rather over enthusiastic father had booked them to play at his daughter's sixth birthday partythinking they were a trio of clown-magicians. Despite the mix-up they set-up in the ball pond and played a set so alienatingly mind-blowing that three kids went on to form Razorlight, two ran out screaming 'stranger danger, stranger danger' and one burped up a jammie dodger in Snake Eyes' hair after singing the whole of Hotel California in Cantonese. Before their final number Michaelson bet the audience all their instruments that he could beat Hippodome mascot Hippo-po-Thomas in three rounds of no rules, bare-knuckle fighting. Michaelson was obviously not aware that the hippo is actually more fricking dangerous than you would think. He was floored with one punch and there, on the floor of a children's play centre and "Kingdom of Fun", ended his musical career.

So, what of The House of Cards today? Michaelson is now working on a gambling awareness cartoon called 'PokerMon'. It aims to introduce children to the highs and lows of gambling but takes a cautious and responsible approach. Yes gambling is fine, but doing it once also makes you want to do it lots. It educates kids, advising them what to do with their chips when they're winning with it's snappy catchphrase - 'Gotta Cash em all'. With the recent advances and reduced cost of laser surgery Snake Eyes has finally had the operation he always desired. Now he just gets called Ian. Babyface (now 63) still has the youthful glow of a man a sixtieth his age. Scientists are interested in carrying out "certain medical procedures" on him to ascertain whether he really holds the secret to eternal youth or whether he has just been taking tips from Andie McDowell. No recordings remain of The House of Cards but it's thought that Snake Eyes' Mum may have one or two cassettes knocking about in the loft.

Interestingly, in 2004 the band appeared as an (incorrect) answer to a question on series two, episode five of hit BBC tv show QI. The question was 'What shall we do with the drunken sailor?'.

#32- The Fort Police

2009-06-25T19:51:00.006+01:00

What do you think of when you hear the words "garage music"? Perhaps you think of Apple's attempt to take anyone who owns a mac and turn them into someone you have not heard of? Perhaps your first thought is of UK Garage? We're sorry if your first thought is of UK Garage. We really are.

But perhaps you are thinking of the genre of garage music, of teenagers struggling to sound like Bo Diddley. If so then we have a story to tell you; and if you were honest, you'd tell us that you have not heard it before.

Have you ever visited West Germany? If you're an American, the answer will probably be: only when I was serving in the Army in the 60s. Of every 10 Americans serving in the US Army in the 1960s, 9.76 of the spent some time in West Germany. And 2.82 of them tried to run away rather than get posted to Vietnam. How do you try and stop vast swathes of fit young trained soldiers escape barracks? You call the Military Police!

3 of the military policemen tasked with preventing anyone cheesing it were Frank Sutton, Roy Stuart and Ted Bessell. They would search high and low for escapees, deserters or other ne'erdowells and only stop when they had caught their man. Or so it appeared to their commanding officers. In actual fact, Sutton, Stuart and Bessell were involved in quite a large amount of assisting people from fleeing the army into rural Germany and assisting their flight to constitutionally chicken Canada. They had to take the occasional one back, and drive around for days looking like they were looking for someone, but they were most certainly part of the informal group of people able to assist conchies in avoiding the horror of Vietnam era Vietnam.

In their long afternoons driving around in their Army jeep, pretending to look for deserters the MPs discussed ice cream, home made pie and the music they all enjoyed. As they were riding together they realised that perhaps they could form an influential rhythm group that melded percussive strumming with layabout antics. They just had the remainder of their tours to serve first.

Honourably discharged in 1966, the band got to Great Britain just in time to assist Pickles the dog in finding the Jules Rimet trophy. Deciding to keep their names out of the spotlight for the time-being, the band agreed to let Pickles take all the credit. (Pickles died some years later in a freak cat-chasing incident. The band attended his funeral along with his owner, David Crobett, and Saint, but not Greavsie.) Following a short stay in Oggsford the band took themselves to Alberta, where they were able to link up with their old Deserter networks and hire practise space for less than a nickel an hour.

The first album, "Storebror" played on the paranoia of the late 60s American underground. The band attempted to describe the government as both corrupt, formidable and incompetent. Their argument seemed to say that the government was not above extreme nastiness to it's own citizens, it just wasn't really able to carry through on it or clean the mess up afterwards. Musically, the album sounds like how a buzz cut must be experienced by a louse, with fast and repetitive two-chord movements getting louder and quieter and louder again. The Canadian general public (who by this time were a minority considering the number of draft dodgers in the area) generally did not interact with the band and the audiences were mainly young, American, morally forthright (or downright cowardly) and rich.

A second album, "Shelled on the Tips of Fingers" saw the band encouraging other people to come and join those already in Canada, ostensibly to avoid the draft but more probably so that their live shows could be even more packed. By this point the Canadian government had had had enough. The band were sent packing over the border, choosing to be deported to Alaska rather than arrested as soon as they hit the mainland. It must also be remembered that Alaska has a very narrow maritime border with a foreign country, Russia. Sensing that this may be their way to get out of the States as soon as possible, the band did actually try to cross the Bering Straight. Indeed, they made it across the Straight only to find out that Russia is a freaking huge country and they could not actually get anywhere approaching a city without months more walking. The band walked back along the Straight and decided to drop anchor in Archorage.

Settling into the lives of American iconoclasts, the band continued to find an outlet for their strum-heavy brand of political activism. Some 17 albums, of mixed and declining quality have since been released. The band are still considered fugitives in the mainland United States and John Rich has personally declared that he will punch them in the nose if he ever gets the chance. Surprisingly, Alaska doesn't care much for mainland rules and the band are free to move about and gig in such interesting places as Trapper Creek, Healy and Anderson. They don't go much further up Alaska Route 3, for fear that they may inadvertently end up Eileson Air Force Base. The rumour is that the Military Police is not what it once was.

#31- Save Britain's Heritage v No 1 Poultry Ltd

2009-06-21T16:33:00.006+01:00

Which Dick said "Let's kill all the lawyers"?

The honest answer is that we don't know. All Shakespeare gave us is "Dick" and as there were a few guys named Richard around at the time we can't be clear which one it was. Whoever it was, he had not heard of the next band YOU have not heard of: Save Britain's Heritage v No. 1 Poultry Ltd.

Law school is boring and repetitive. You learn some facts, you spew them out on parchment, you have a shower. Most trainee lawyers get themselves through it by thinking of all the gold and jewels they will get in this life and the next, when they will enter law heaven. However, our heroes today would not have any gilden trappings of this now or in the future. They were going to be legal aid and Social Security lawyers, testing their toughness and preparedness of mind against Yvette Cooper and her department of DWP legal eagles in a fight to the lunchtime.

Originally, Richard DeVere had tried to become successful in music through the medium of the law gag one hit wonder. The idea was every lawyer would be enthralled by the song long enough to buy it, and if every lawyer in the country bought the song then it would go straight to number 1. Some blame the concept, although others suggest it was the song he chose, but Mr Baumbastic -a tale of love, loss and entitlement to extended rights due to connection with an education authority gained whilst other rights were being exercised- was not purchased by even 1% of the law community. Saddened by this, DeVere decided to foment an alliance with some of his classmates and make a concept album about the only subject that mattered to him at the time.

DeVere hand-picked everyone in his year that could play an instrument: Audrey fforbes-Hamilton tinkled the ivories, Marjory Frobisher blew on an aerophone, Brabinger did whatever came naturally and Brigadier Lemington OBE (real name Arthur Sharp) played the bongos with vigour. Their union was to be for only one album and one album only: TV on the Bookio. The concept relied on the difference in legal status caused by the divergent outcomes of the book and television series of Tracy Beaker.

In the book "The Story Tracy Beaker" the protagonist was fostered by Cam Lawson, meaning that any care order in place over her remains. This does not necessarily mean that the fostering would end at any point if this continued to be seen as successful. However, in the TV version, in what DeVeres described as "a happy-go-lucky attempt by Social Services to discharge their duty of care in a haphazard and unhelpful way," Tracy is adopted by Cam and her new husband Gary.

The album begins with "13, 14, 16", a slow and meditative opener explaining the main legal point of their argument:
"13 weeks before you're fourteen,
and one day after your sixteenth,
then you'd get so much help, love
and care, care, care in the world."

After setting their legal stall they explained, blisteringly and through the use of Gregorian noise-flute that "Tracy Beaker was Born Innocent." From this point on the album manages to list many of the things being seen as a relevant child or former relevant child would entitle Tracy Beaker to after the age of 16:

Full assistance until the age of 18 with all financial and housing costs if required,
Fees, living and housing costs whilst in full time further and higher education,
A Pathway Plan and designated worker to assist in times of need both practically and financially,
Extra duty under the Housing Act 1996 (Amended 2002 and by Priority Needs Order 2001) due to vulnerability caused by being in care, and
An exemption from the shared room rent condition for Housing Benefit in private properties, allowing the one bedroom rate to be paid to a single person.

up until she was 21, or older if she remained in full time education. Sweet.

But -the band said- she was robbed of this, and for what? For a change in legal status that made little difference in the long run and provided an unassailable panacea (incorrectly pronounced on the album as pancetta) for the suffering real little children currently in Social Care. The band attest that the best thing was for Cam to foster Tracy in the long term, at least until Tracy is 16 and an eligible child. The BBC, the band decided had erred badly.

The BBC have repeatedly failed to comment on the album, or even mention it. Rumours are rife that a number of executive researchers are looking for new jobs after failing to notice the legal issues underlying the problem and Andrew Marr himself is considering coming out in favour of the band's suggestion, if only Terry Wogan will back him. Protests on the streets are becoming louder and more threatening and the BBC is promising to release their own version of the Praetorian Guard (Barry Chuckle and Jim from EastEnders) in order to quell the riots.

This is not over yet.

You Have Not Heard - The Book!

2009-06-19T21:24:00.032+01:00

The internet sensation that has taken South Korea and Uruguay by storm is set to be released as a paperback! Great!

You will be able to join with us as we recall once again some of the greatest acts that never quite found fame, including such luminaries as The LLandudno Border Colliers, Dismissive Missive, The Gaffer Tapes and more!

Along the way we hope to answer such questions as:

-Why do birds suddenly appear?
-What is the world record for capuchin monkeys wearing trousers?
-What is Bono's favourite colour?

The crickets are already calling it THE paperback release about bands that You Have Not Heard of 2009. You can guarantee that someone somewhere will rate it at least three thumbs up out of fourteen.

It's coming. You can't stop it. You may not want it but you will buy it. You'll laugh. You'll cry. You'll get that thing where a little bit of sick comes up.

Contains approximately 0.5% new material.

#30 Widget

2009-06-15T21:06:00.387+01:00

Who knew that robots would ever amount to so much? After all, their school reports were always so mediocre... "Little Robby understands the practical applications of metaphysics, and has an appreciation for the Renaissance painters, but has a tendency to torment his fellow pupils before blasting them with his ray gun eyes". "Mickey tries hard but can sometimes go a bit 'HAL9000'. When I asked him to sit down and be quiet he said - 'I know you and Frank are planning to seat me, and I'm afraid that's something I cannot allow to happen'. I don't even know who Frank is". Distraught teachers aside, nowadays we rely on tiny robots to practically run our lives. Not only that, but little Robby's great great grandson's brains now power my waffle iron. Amazing!

If 'Batteries Not Included' taught us one thing it's that if your apartment building is about to be torn down by faceless corporate America you can rely on robots from outerspace to lend you a helping hand. And if that, and toasting waffles is all they ever achieve, they can power down happy. But wait! Here we have a robot who made a name for himself in the world of music. A robot who tore up the user manual and dared to press 'Control Alt Funk'.

The Dave Matthews Band, Van Halen, and The Barry Manilow Experience. Everyone knows that the greatest bands are named after their lead singer. The band Widget were no exception, taking their name from main protagonist Widget 2000. The band consisted Widget on all instruments and six Servers at the University of California which ensured Widget kept in time, tune and within legal levels of decibels. For all intents and purposes Widget was a computer chip inside a large box. Despite this, he was a dashing young android with the computing power of two and a half Carol Vodermans, and the looks of a robot James Dean. Widget was originally designed by professors at the University of California, having been commissioned by the Secretary of Defence. He was going to be the next big thing in human cyborg relations - a cold merciless killing machine. But, just like Vin Diesel and 1980s Action Man, he had a beautiful singing voice. It was this that saved him from a life of time, grime and war crimes. Having been fitted with one of the earliest form of artificial intelligence he quickly developed complex self awareness and could even tell the difference between some reds and greens, despite being colour blind.

The band were nurtured by the professors at UCLA and encouraged to produce music. Widget's combined relay protocol transfer system networking capabilities made them the most prolific song writers in the business. By the end of their career they had produced over thirty five thousand albums. The most noteworthy include:

Binary and Finery
Mean Machine
I, Widget
Cyborg Relations
By-Onyx
Mega Bits/Mega Bucks! (The Best Of)
01101001011011100010000001110100
0110100001100101001000000110001
0011000010110001001111001001000
0001101101011000010110101101100
1010111001001110011001000000110
0010011000010110001001111001
Rickypedia (Edit Him At Your Peril (Cos He Has Laser Gun Knees))
Raindrops and Petticoats
Automaton Love
Eh? Aye!
I love 01011001 01001000 01001110 01001000

They have been so productive that instead of a year of release, each title is given a time and date of release. In one night alone the septet had written, recorded and mastered twelve thousand songs. Seminal work "The Appliance of Violence", which hit the charts at 4:05am on 15 March 1972, is their magnum opus. It charts Widget 2000's early battles with current abuse and domestic violence. The sounds he emitted from his tonebox on this album were without doubt some of the freshest, tastiest bytes ever produced. Their live performances were their tour de force. A Widget gig was sort of like playing a Spectrum ZX with your eyes closed, without touching any buttons and whilst standing next to a hundred or so other people wearing 'I Heart Linux' and 'Jobs for President' t-shirts doing exactly the same.

Wheeled onto stage by burly roadies he would sit centre stage, with the Servers appearing on big screens behind him. San Antonio 12 May 1978. The finest gig to ever feature a robot performer live linked to to the rest of his band. Widget busted out a superb blend of classics, new songs and an acoustic half hour that drained the milliamps for a radius of three miles. "Is everybody feeling adequately entertained and refreshed?" Widget quipped (he always had a great rapport with his fans). "My memory circuits are telling me that you have provided satisfactory levels of appreciation tonight. For that my pleasure unit is thankful". It was then, during his fifth encore that he broke out the Ms Pacman theme. Well, what can you say to that. It wasnt until primates started throwing barrels and foxes started piloting sophisticated spacecraft in the 80s that geeks would again wet themselves in unison with such aplomb.

At their height Widget regularly appeared in the popular Computer and Robotics periodicals of the day and could count Dolly Parton and Donald Trump amongst their famous fans. However, by the end of the 70s Widget's antics became more bizarre as the power went to his head. Central to the problems was his relationship with hot to trot celebrity of the day - Deep Blue. Believe it or not IBM were happy for their protégé to date Widget. They felt it was healthy for two young brilliant minds to want to do what they computed appropriate. Widget rejected the suggestion that the relationship was a publicity stunt at the couples fifth vow renewal. Despite this it wasn't long after that they declared themselves "incompatible". Rumour has it that that a dashing young Russian named Gary Kasparov had come between them. Two days after the public break-up, whilst on stage in San Fransisco, Widget declared himself king of all Transformers. He managed to bend himself into the shape of a unicorn riding a panda before short circuiting. It was the beginning of the end for Widget the band. The Servers were getting angsty at not being able to be present at their gigs, and motioned for a change of name to 'Widget and the Servers'. Truth be told they just wanted a piece of the Parton.

On 17 December 1982 Widget was pronounced obsolete - beyond patching and after they realised defragging really wasn't doing anything. Widget may be long gone but his memory lives on (it was the only salvageable part of him). The Servers continue to make music to this day as a six piece Barbershop Quartet. Just weeks after he powered down it was released that he had a particularly virulent Trojan - probably introduced by USB stick whilst his firewall was down. Gary Kasparov - I'm looking at you here.

So, each time you put on an audio disc, play Space Invaders at your local arcade or boot up your BBC Micro just remember - there is a little bit of Widget in there. Who knows, one day there may even be a full motion robot band whose metallic, boxy, warblings will have us getting our old LPs out and saying "you do know that they are just a Widget rip off son?". In the mean time if it is monotone tunes devoid of emotion you are after you may have to stick the next best thing. The new Athlete album is out in September.

#29 Fingers Like Fish

2009-06-14T14:35:00.008+01:00

It's pretty hard to be legitimate when you've been sold out in childhood. Just ask Fergie; she had to go from being on American TV to joining the the royal family to do whatever it is she does now. The next band that You have Not Heard of tried to mark a similar trajectory but -as ever on this site- it turned out to be a pronounced parabola, as gravity's rainbow took it's toll once more.

We all know Captain Crowsfeet fish fingers: "Get your fishy fishy fingers and stick 'em in your face, don't let the cameras see you, or there'll be a disgrace." And of course we all remember the adverts, where our whiskered Captain would chase a group of children around an island and then reveal his "treasure", which happily turned out to be some fish fingers and not anything else.

Five of the children chased around the island were Cecelia Bloom, Hillary Essex, Sammy Pinkers, Iris Myandowski and Julie Burrows. Most of these young children had not really been asked or allowed to contemplate whether or not they wanted to be thrust into the spotlight. Their parents had always just assumed they wanted to be famous and didn't care how that happened. Whether this is true or not, after a couple of years on The Captain's Ship (and indeed, for Pinkers, on the Captain's Table) the children wanted nothing more than to be done with celebrity and fame.

But how does one redeem oneself? Is there any penance or indulgence possible for you to overcome the tainting process of blanket advertising? Could they waltz past pictures of their own faces in order to gain entrance to the back door of a toilet gig-house? Would they be courted by A&R people wanting to feed off their story into multi-platinum soul-free recordings? Would the Captain make a comeback to show them the rest of his treasure? To answer those questions, yes, yes and no, because he's fictional. But then yes.

Sure, not selling out was very hard. They had people trying to sign them before the gigs even took place, not having heard anything. Of course the back story was very easy to write into a press release and the media kit probably makes itself if left unattended for any length of time. The band had to try so hard not to get signed that they would avoid putting their name on anything, travelling under pseudonyms (would you believe, they used sit-com character names!) and avoiding all hand-based communication with the deaf. Eventually they succumbed to the sweet sweet soothings of indie-nerd label MUGAdeath. The label was known for its open ended contracts and that all of the business operations were conducted under a metal basketball net, which was itself in front of a soccer goal and next to some fixed cricket stumps with no bail. Here the band signed and their music was set to be produced, distributed and, who knows, perhaps even listened to.

The band hit the studio and the studio did not know what hit it. It was the band. 11 breezy, sweet, densely written songs were recorded in a little over 3 days. Someone at the record company suggested calling the genre applecore, but that had apparently already been done. Eventually they decided to call the genre Macawcore, as Essex's vocals matched that of a restless screeching bird. The album lyrics and title "Fortress of Solitude, Fortress of Peenemünd", referred to the band's constant insistence that scientific discoveries had a value on their own, unconnected with the way in which those discoveries are used. Self-elected social commentators have stated that perhaps the band were doing this in order to salvage their acting reputations from the grips of Captain Crowsfeet. Other social commentators have said that's just silly.

By the second album, "HyperHysterical Realism" the band were disintegrating fast. Recording in different rooms, using different demo tapes and recording different songs, the band managed to create an air of cogency through the production of Masso Much, who was lucky enough to hear music very, very well. Few people agreed and it sold fewer units than The Captain's Cod Conkers, a nutty brew of farm-grown fish and horse-chesnuts.

The band are in talks with the Captain for a reunion tour. Their dreams of artistic independence lie in tatters and all parties agree that everyone's careers can only be saved by an unholy reunion. A new generation will now find where he keeps his treasure. We can only hope he hasn't moved it.

#28 Tawdry Hepburn

2009-06-08T21:56:00.165+01:00

Hillbilly rock, hillbilly roll, stand in line and away we go.... Away we go that is to the The Ear Nose and Throat Museum of Amsterdam. The unlikely setting for the genesis of a four piece US girl band you might think. And you would be wrong. It all makes sense when you get to know a little bit more about Tawdry Hepburn...

Now don't get confused. We are not talking about the cockney B*Witched with guitars - Hepburn here. There are marked differences between the two. Whilst Hepburn would say - "'Ello guv'nor. Oi just got apples and pears down me ole dicky dirt oi did". Tawdry Hepburn would be all like; "Look-ie here mister. I be sayin that you be headin' fo' a hidin' from one of them po-lice". Besides, our four piece girl group have probably never heard of the UK's Hepburn or, wait for it, even B*Witched. I know, I know! As you can no doubt guess from the southern drawl Tawdry Hepburn are a four piece girl group from Birmingham, Alabama where the men look like women and the women look like ZZ Top. Population 229,800.

Despite being in the deep south, Birmingham Alabama is, in alot of ways, sort've like Birmingham, UK. It has an airport - just like Birmingham UK. It has a population of both men and women just like Birmingham, UK. Birmingham, UK is affectionately called the Black Country whilst deep south Birmingham.... er.... that's probably where the similarity ends.

The two sets of twin girls (Laine, Blane, Jayne and Bobbie-Jo Leigh) were brought up in the US city until the age of 13. It was at that age that the problems started, problems with paperbacks that is. Apparently the young tearaways would enlist the help of their fellow classmates (forced or otherwise) into recreating some of children's literature's finest moments. Fine, you might think. Children should get more out of books, you might think. I can't even begin to tell you how many goats perished in a rather ambitious re-creation of Heidi. On another occasion they broke into the local zoo taking class punch bag Randal McShuttlecock with them dressed as a poor old washer woman, in search of a vole and a badger. Forget Grand Theft Auto, Kenneth Graham has a lot to answer for.

With their children facing serious charges of endangering a goat under the influence and demeaning a male otter with intent, their parents decide to move to Amsterdam to start a new life with all four daughters in tow. They had heard great things about the Dutch capital - a city of culture and history with no Randal McShuttlecock and, possibly more importantly, no otters.

The band's parents found gainful employment in the local library. They were perfectly placed to head of any future 'mishaps' with their daughters. When no one was looking they would secretly remove all the copies of Black Beauty and Gulliver's Travels. In some cases they would look for sections which could easily be turned into impromptu drama skits and would blank them out with a marker pen.

By the age of seventeen the girls all had a weekend job at Amsterdam's premier ear nose and throat museum - The Ear Nose and Throat Museum of Amsterdam. Blaine covered the section devoted to ears, Laine noses and Jayne throats. Bobbie-Jo worked in the gift shop on account of her 'purdy disposition'. After just three months Bobbie-Jo had had her fill of selling novelty ear-rasers and nose pencil sharpeners and, together with her sisters, planned a walkout. It was a particularly bad day at the office - Laine was dressed as a nose, Blaine an ear and Jayne as the lower pharynx. They requested a meeting with their manager Ronald VanRutgers. "Lookie ear Mr Ronald - we've had enough of this and we nose you nose that we have". They had clearly worked there too long and were also suffering severe literature deprivation. "You will just have to spell esophagus without us" they retorted and stormed out in a flurry of orifice paraphernalia.

It seemed that their early dreams of a life teaching Amsterdammers about the joys of the eustachian tube were not quite what they imagined. Their reaction? To form a pop rock, dixie inspired girl group that would mix good ole fashioned hoity-toity ho-downs with a riot of indie punk which quickly became known as Hick-rock. The Dutch loved Tawdry Hepburn as one of their own. This is hardly surprising when you consider that 'Dutch music' is possibly the greatest of all oxymorons. The only notable exception is the popsters responsible for the theme tune to hit tv show 'Friends' -The Rembrants. Who else is there? Contrary to popular belief the Cardigans were actually from the Nicaragua and Golden Earring were just rubbish. The Dutch dedication and protection of this group goes a long way to explaining why You Have Not Heard of this redneck quartet.

The girls played in Amsterdam bars on a Friday night whipping up quite a following. They were spotted by an industry whizz from Irate Puppy Records, whosigned them up on the spot. Their first single Moonshine Micky went straight in at number one in the Dutch pop charts. In March 1998 their first album 'Formaldahide Your Love From Me' was released to critical acclaim. Their label managed to book them into a slot on hit Dutch music TV show 'Wau! Pop!'. Host Jaap VanHeerenveen took to them immediately and it was on his advice that that try and break the American market.

Leaving their parents back in the 'Dam they moved triumphantly back to Birmingham in 1999. Not satisfied with becoming Birmingham Alabama's greatest export since the original Birmingham was exported to the US over nine hundred years ago the girls returned to conquer the states. Despite initial interest from the public the girls have made very little impact since returning home ten years ago, but they still play every Friday night at Randy Jo's Bar. Laine has six children (five of which may be hers). Blaine has joined some sort of clan thingmy her boyfriend runs - she's not sure if it's really for her, but she likes to keep busy. Jayne and Bobbie-Jo have set up their own musical detective agency. Their first job was to foil an operation in which Mexicans were being brought into the states inside the stomachs of live cows. It turns out it was local law official OfficerJackson all along. "And i wud've gotta away with it if it weren't for your pesky riffs" he retorted rather pugnaciously. Linedance your way out of that one Officer!

So, what is left for this fearsome foursome? Well they have only ever really had one dream - to one day emulate the success of their hero Miley Ray Cyrus (wife and sister of "achey brakey" Billy Bob Thornton). Who knows one day they may just make it.

Hillbillies eh? What's all that about?

#27 Born Again, Dead Again

2009-06-07T14:14:00.004+01:00

Leeds Corn Exchange. Two things you think you'd assume from the name is:

You'd be able to buy food,
Said food will be sold at wholesale prices.

Until recently, you'd be wrong about the first point. You were not able to buy food at Leeds Corn Exchange unless you ate it in the cafe. The place was a rough and ready youth-centred shopping arcade, selling jokey t-shirts, canvas prints and humorous postcards. To compliment this an increasingly large group of Goths used to hang around outside, trying to summon up the courage to go in and ask for a t-shirt that said "Nobody Known I'm a Plebian" or "The Penguins are not responsible for my Sanity" or indeed anything you could get on a t-shirt that Sandi Thom hadn't stolen and make crap by association.

Then the bankers came along and turned the Corn Exchange into a food emporium. This means the food is not cheap at all. They turfed out the current tenants and convinced most of the Goths to go away and leave them to tuck into their steak tartare in peace. Thus a large, migratory group of mostly wholesome young people set about finding somewhere they could hang without formality. This became challenge of practically biblical proportions, when the Goths found that no-one else wanted them. Indeed, at only one location was hanging around outside in large numbers acceptable to the other people nearby. That place was the Family Planning Clinic.

When the latter-day wanders arrived they were greeted by cheers, handed placards and ginger cake and asked to sign about 40 petitions. They did this with glee and gamely held the placards whilst maintaining their normal activities of talking, playing unamplified electric guitar and smoking roll-ups.

Eventually though, they had to justify to themselves why they were standing outside an abortion clinic. They were lucky to have one of the best Goth philosophers in all Christendom with them. Darkcartes took three gruelling weeks to graft pro-life sensibilities onto Goth's overriding philosophy. His argument started with the lemma that the goal of existence for Goths was to choose to feel suffering.

§ Choosing to embrace rather than repudiate suffering sets the Goths apart from other people.
§ Suffering at it's most extreme is represented by the thought of hell.
§ The ultimate Goth ambition is to embrace the suffering of hell.
§ Physical pain and cruelty cannot in-themselves create suffering.
§ Pain, death and other forms of physical intervention relieve suffering rather than continue it.

Conclusion 1: Goths prefer life to death.

§ Life includes talking, thinking, holding and maintaining the concept of physical pain and death.
§ One cannot be a Goth until you have chosen to embrace suffering and the thought of pain.
§ You cannot decide whether to embrace suffering until you have been born.

Conclusion 2: Foetuses cannot be Goths.

§ A person needs to choose whether they embrace suffering in order to have successfully lived.

Conclusion 3: Foetuses should not be denied the choice to be Goths.

Conclusion 4: Abortion prevents the choice of conclusion 3 and is therefore wrong.

Darkcartes also stated that "If you wake up one day and you have a tennis player attached to you, and the doctors tell you it's going to last for 9 months, then think how much suffering that's going to cause. Their going to go on and on about their backhand and how much training they're going to have to do and whether they'll ever be good enough for their overbearing father and on and on and bleeding well on. Well, you can just imagine the suffering you're going to go through for 9 months. Lucky guy!"

Now what the heck does this have to with bands? Well, 4 of the assorted dark-rockers took the philosophy of Darkcartes and put it to music. The resulting album "Darkness of the Womb" was a moderate success amongst their friends. It's unfair to call it drone metal; they just didn't know how to turn the amplifiers down.

Normal Service Will Resume Shortly

2009-06-06T15:49:00.004+01:00

We're sorry. There has been some busy-ness of late and neither of us have been able to post about bands You have Not Heard.

Specifically; I have been standing in the European elections and the last few days have required heavy campaigning. As a member of The Christian English Workers Socialist-Democratic Liberal Tory Lib-Lab Natural Law and Order (Special Victim's Unit) (George Galloway) Party my work has been cut out, arguing with the good people of this country that we should be in, out, all about and leading Europe by the nose.

Tom has been recovering from an illness he'd prefer me not to mention by name. Rest assured, penicillin cures it right up in no time at all. Thank goodness we live in the 21st Century!

#26 Citizen Suit

2009-05-29T17:37:00.084+01:00

Did you know, 40% of the world's surface is covered in bands You Have Not Heard of? The other 60% is mainly taken up with U2's sense of self satisfaction. Citizen Suit are most definitely in the lower, but undoubtedly more eco-friendly of the two percentiles.

Citizen Suit are one of those new 'Eco-bands' you have been hearing so much about from this blog entry. They are the next big thing to come out of Swampy, the Polecats Riots of the 1980s and having too much time on your hands not to buy a car, watch Top Gear, and think the Jeremy Clarkson should really be the next Prime Minister. After all he talks such sense.

Randall P Dusk, Trevor Hope Lennon and Cosmic Daphne are our fearsome trio, who are in fact just one member short of a quartet. Interesting. The name, 'Citizen Suit', is somewhat of a sly misnomer on the part of the group. They pride themselves on never having warn a suit (except for that time when Trevor got sick all down his only Thundercats t-shirt and had no choice but to don jacket and tie). They also refuse to exist as "citizens of a country which persecutes the barn owl and threatens the very existence of natterjack toads of the West Drayton area by the expansion of that new Lidl".

Despite their clearly defined moral stance the band weren't always this green. Sure they used to turn their washing machines down to 30° and ensure their humvees were taken off standby but, frankly, who doesn't? Some argue that they are now cashing in the good intentions of a population. A population who have been duped into thinking the end is nigh if they don't swap their existing frying pan for a plug and play, energy saving model. Their fans on the other hand would argue that the band, and Dusk in particular, have a higher calling to educate and nurture the world's population to a better future, in harmony with ourselves and our little vole buddies.

The rarely bathed trio started out in a flat in London with a pair of bongoes and, that staple of all fledgling musicians, the Early Learning Centre kazoo. They would busk day and night in Covent Garden, earning literally pounds for just an hours work. The group quickly became fans of the obscure ethnic instrument, and the more ethnically obscure the better. Each member of the group is well rehearsed in the use of, amongst others, the Didgeriflute from the Former Yugoslav Republic of Pakistan, the Bass-a-ma-panpipes from Argentania, and a copy of New Internationalist magazine played with a violin bow, from all good newsagents.

To this day they live like trendy urban nomads, setting up camp in a new London village each night. At first it was a daily struggle against the fat cats, who would sneak into their camp late at night and eat all the cornflakes. Who would have thought something so orange could be so girth augmenting? By the summer of 2007 that they had created a name for themselves in the deprived West Kensington slum area of London, and formed collaborations with other groups who were also exploiting the area. Of particular note are their efforts with both local panpipe heroes '¡DeepPan!' from Guatemalia and 'Pan on Pan Action' from Peruvia. "I'm like Francis of Assisi, Doolittle wants to be me, the sea creatures they all love me, 'Cos we all need a Porpoise" they would chant in unison.

Several unquestioningly positive things have come out of the band's existence. Their 'Hug a Badger Programme' for young offenders and their 'Recycle to Work Scheme' to name but a few. And, of course not forgetting their 'Deport Alan Titchmarsh Petition' - not so much to save the planet, but a good idea nonetheless (if only for his novels).

Their first and only disc is a concept album on which they decided to parody the Amazon rainforest and it's contents. The quirky and quip laden thirty minute ethno-fest pokes fun at everything from loggers (effeminate lady-boys) to Japanese whalers (dubbed the al qaeda of the seas on track three - 'I can't believe they Nine-Elevened a Narwhal'). "Treefrog, greenfrog, your feet stick to the big log" they gibed. Inspirational if true. The album 'Tropical Satire' was released on 2 March 2009 and is available direct from the band only - infront of them as they busk (just put a donation in their Sitar-a-phone case). I give the album three thumbs up out of fourteen, and that's despite the fact that every purchase comes with a free bag for life.

Citizen Suit are currently taking a gap year rearing young pygmy goats on a farm just outside Staines, West London. In their place other bands have sprung up hoping to benefit from the early groundwork laid by Citizen Suit - Tribe of the Savanna from Hounslow and Children of the Mangrove from Musgrove, to name but two.

So, for those of us left wondering where this whole eco-band phenomenon is taking us I implore you to watch this. Ok, so that didn't have alot to do with new music but hey, at least we can all sleep soundly knowing that the size of a whale is the exact distance between a toddler's raised hands. And that that kind of knowledge is well celebrated in Philadelphia. And after all - isn't that all that really matters in the end? Isn't it?

What harm will one more sheet of paper do? Go on, print this blog entry.

#25 Fit Female Bassists

2009-05-24T15:27:00.004+01:00

Sometimes it's hard to be a woman. Never more so than in the macho world of twee indie rock, where women are frequently used only as eye candy, bassists or sleepy backing vocalists. Fit Female Bassists came to change all of that. Their success was limited, but the unexpected outcome was some sweet-natured musical moments of musical happiness.

Our band was formed when the women realised they would get nowhere with the help of men; nowhere that is, except to be left holding a bass guitar or a baby. The 4 members hired a flat in Monkton and set about trying to destroy the male dominated music industry. Diana Trent, the permanently elected spokeswoman for the group also played the electric guitar in normal tuning. Jane Edwards produced the literature and played the electric guitar in drop C tuning. Marion Ballard concentrated on long-term strategic vision and played the acoustic guitar in whichever of Joni Mitchell's tunings she saw fit at the time. Sarah Snow provided 2nd tier logistical support and played the cymbal.

The first record "women deserve more than an hour" came with 4 posters, a 107 page manifesto, an equal opportunities monitoring form and instructions on how to get the album in 18 different languages, braille and in large print. It also advised listeners that "If you need any assistance in understanding what this album means, please seek help from your local Citizen's Advice Bureau or other advice agency before doing anything else."

The manifesto -whichever language you happened to read it in- would have been more help if it wasn't just a sequence of unexplained and poorly linked together three-letter acronyms. One particularly excruciating sentence read "We shall look to link BIP with BAP in line with further strategic objectives of GAP, TAP, WIP and FIG, looking further to SWQ the XCV parameters."

Luckily, the album itself had some musical gems. "Bulbous Lobes" told the story of one woman's struggle against mastoiditis, "UVA UVB UVme" is an impassioned call to remain pastily skinned in summer and "Diaper Factory" is about a diaper factory where women make money to spend on their children. Throughout, the different tunings and lush arrangements make the band sound like BIS on horse-tranquillisers, or Sonic Youth fronted by Jean Sibelius in a particularly wistful mood. With their accidentals pock-marking the passages and duelling guitars managing to endeavour through a prism of non-competitive games, the band make a melodic but arrhythmic 45 minutes of joy. It's frankly -and I say this as a man- stonking stuff. Enjoyment of it is tempered by the need to fill in an online "Tell us what you think" form every time you listen to the album; you have to rate Timbre as either well above satisfactory, above satisfactory, satisfactory, below satisfactory or well below satisfactory. To be honest, timbre doesn't change much on multiple listens and we'd appreciate being asked once and once alone.

This would all be very much in the YHNH field of experience only. But there is something in the back of your mind thinking "I'm sure I've heard of these women before." You'd be right, but that shameful story is almost too heartbreaking to tell. I do so only on the precondition that you have box of tissues awaiting your tears.

At a quorate meeting of the 4 members of the band it was decided that they would move forward by asking real women for their views. In a mix up attributed by the band to anything but committee thinking, the questionnaires were sent to Colleen's Real Women, who -God help us all- responded and CCed the questionnaire to Loose Women: TV's answer to the question "what are Lynda Bellingham's finances looking like?" The responses received from the questionnaire revealed that 'real women' are interested in:

Why their husbands always leave the car keys in different places,
What is the best way to marry a footballer,
Has anyone seen the new Batman film? I loved the makeup,
Why does the lady that brings the tea think she can have a conversation with us?
What do I do all day when my husband is at work?
Doesn't everyone agree with me? Girls. you agree with me, yeah?
And, last and oddest of all "let's have a revolution!"

Feeling bound to these responses, the group could do nothing else but produce a poor pop album where women's oppression was not understood, merely felt. Although they tried to reconcile this with a project they assumed they would do at some point in the future, they were sad that they had not been able to delineate the groundings of a woman's condition before they told anyone how strange it must be to be The Woman Destroyed. The circumstances forced them to the corner and they bravely fought it with all their hearts. Still, this would be a bizarre little story to tell if it were not for track 6 on the album "The Octopussycat Molls".

Whilst actually a slightly strained reference to about 6 different things at once, the track was assumed by all and sundry to be an attack song on the Pussycat Dolls. The Dolls themselves, always open to some free publicity and to get in a fight (let alone to fight a common enemy to prevent any more internal friction) released a 'response'' song "Unfit for porpoise, porbass or portcullis".

Unable to take the pressure of fighting a very different group with a very different ethos, and, frankly, slightly sick of each other's moralising, Fit Female Bassists look like they are on the way out. They just need to wait until the AGM to make that decision.

#24 Hearing Cape for the Mute

2009-05-23T09:39:00.005+01:00

Everyone knows capes are cool. Capes are this year's raccoon skin hat. Everyone knows being mute is cool. Being mute is this year's being blind. So a cape that makes mute people hear is super cool! Hearing Cape for the Mute are the epitome of cool - dressed head to toe in tailored fur suits. However, as you may expect from a band who come from a country where the sun always sets and reindeer are your feudal overlords, their music is on the relentlessly grim side.

Above right - Geoff Capes in a cape (not in Hearing Cape for the Mute)

These Finnish alt rockers offer more shoegazing than if Ride and My Bloody Valentine organised a joint day trip to the Clarks outlet shop at Lakeside. Unfortunately when you spend so much time looking down you tend to walk into lamposts or make debut albums so poor even the NME don't like it before not liking it or vice versa.

The trio started out in downtown Helsinki in a student bedsit, eating pickled herring on toast and listening to Weather Report albums for years on end. Tove Hattifatteners, Jansson Pietilä and My Hemulen all found themselves working in the local Old Fashioned Sweet Emporium. The band practiced regularly but never took it too seriously until Tove, in a pickled herring stupor, had this great idea for a book in which an underwater paradise is populated by people with snorkels on their heads. Thus 'The Snorks' was born and went on to become a hit TV show, and not just in Belgium. Interestingly, you would never see a Snork surface for air and Tove never did explain why they needed snorkels if they could breath underwater already. You'd think the greedy bastards would be content with gills, but no.

Using the funds created by his venture in to the world of animation Tove relocated the band to London in 1991 where they met up with their good friends, and Finnish musical counterparts, HIM. At the time the members of HIM were working as usherettes at the local picture house. 'Salt or sweet?' they enquired and 'Show you to your seat guv'nor?' they would quip. The two bands shared a flat in Pimlico because they liked the way it sounded - PIM-LICO. Brilliant! they thought.

However, the good times and the money didn't last long. The group had bought so many Weather Report records that they could literally no longer move in their flat (and their herring contingency fund had taken a battering). HIM got a bit angry, moved out and became the goth rockers we know and detest today. So, being migrant workers Tove and his buddies popped down to the jobcentre to pick up their state supplied standard issue mobile phone, keys to their mini mopeds and brand new leather jackets. They spent their nights playing Wolfenstien on LAN and chuckling to themselves about how after five years in the country they could collect the leather trousers to go with that jacket.

Around the same time they had a residency at Copa Capybara in Camden and were gigging nightly. On the back of their minor live success they released the 1996 album 'Take You Down To Chinatown'. The morose self indulgent depress-fest was nothing if not terrible, or 'clappen trappen' as the Finnish press dubbed it.

Amazingly, the band are still going and you can catch them playing the odd gig at Copa Capybara and even The Pink Flamingo in Marylebone (yes, they liked the name of this one too 'Mary the Bone'? Crazy! they thought). Tove is currently working on a screen play for an historical love story based on the 1858 conflict between The Snorks and The Smurfs. Set against a backdrop of infighting, inbreeding and mass genocide the love of a Snork and a Smurf is quite something to behold. 'Blue is the Colour', which sees the Smurfs depth charge the Snorks back to the stone age, is under option with at least two high school film and media students.

#23 My Granddad

2009-05-20T19:05:00.005+01:00

My Granddad may not seem like the kind of person we'd be reviewing on this site. Sure, he may have the air of a rock and roller, but what septuagenarian does not? I'll tell you this, the first thing I remember My Granddad telling me was, "You know the cover of Abbey Road? That was a veiled reference to me."

I didn't believe him; I thought something's about medication and the nonsense My Granddad often told me. He claimed to have an invisible dog and once even that he parachuted into Scotland in 1941, in an attempt to sue Churchill for peace. That all changed one day in 2005, when a scruffy Dostoevsky-alike arrived and frogmarched him to a studio. Taking the facts as they have shown themselves to me, I am now able to present the jigsaw in it's original form.

My Granddad did not immediately have an interest in professional musicmaking. First he was a child and then there was a war. After that it was teatime and then he thought about playing the guitar. First he had to learn and given that times was austere it took him until 1949 to really consider forming a band.

Assembling his war-buddies at the Woking Men's Club, My Granddad rated each audition in a way which would have been reminiscent of The Gong Show, had it existed at the time. If he thought there was no talent in 20 seconds, he would stamp his feet and they'd have to get out. If he let them play, he'd rate them, although he was known for his stern marking and propensity to stamp his feet when enjoying the music. Eventually, the band had been selected. Although most of the chosen few played instruments more in keeping with big band style recordings, My Granddad insisted on the band sounding and acting like a skiffle group. Exactly how you palm mute a saxophone is unknown, but My Grandad requested it and the Saxophonist (Ken Chapman, 1925-1999) managed to create a not too dissimilar sonoural experience.

Looking for a name that summed up their disregard for the status quo but attention to detail and self-preservation, the group hit on The Zebra Crossings. As My Granddad explained, Zebra Crossings were for everything new, including the Green Cross Code. To celebrate, My Granddad gave David Prowse (then aged 14) a ticket to their first gig. The young Prowse invited all his friends -of which there were many (who the hell wouldn't be friends with the future body (if not voice) of Darth Vader)-, and the gig sold out. The band soon sold out themselves, taking on a string of less-than-glorious advertising roles speaking against the mounting scientific evidence that jumping from a cliff was bad for you. "Jump from a cliff?" My Granddad shamefully said "full of flavour, good for your teeth and leaves a taste in your mouth for weeks to come!"

Eventually the touring schedule got to the 13 piece band, as did the living quarters where all but My Granddad were forced to share a bed. Referring to the conditions many of the band grew up in as a child, My Granddad opined that at least they had 0.08333 of a bed each. In order to stop the overcrowding and related virus-infestations, 5 members of the band left in 1962. Aware of the instability this created in the band -let alone the bed- My Granddad suggested that they changed their name. And so, in that Düsseldorf dormitory, The Panda Crossings was born.

Moving away from skiffle, the band settled on a form of industrial music that was not really of it's time. Sure, they had the right country for industrial music (and one very young paperboy by the name of Blixa Bargeld was definitely impressed) but they probably got there a little too early to be understood by the masses.

A new line-up change left just My Granddad from the original members and took the band in the surprising direction of chamber-rock. Part of this came from having such few members and part of it came from the liberation of having so few numbers. Suddenly silence could be embraced and the new name, The X-Ray Crossings, really added nothing apart from timely historical accuracy.

In 1969, tired of the emotional roller-coaster of name-changes and instore performances at Woolworths, My Granddad decided to go it alone and record using only a boombox. Always earlier than fashion, My Granddad had to wait until 1978 for the boombox to be invented for him to record anything new. When the new album "Bread, Dripping, Living, Workin'" finally did come out, My Granddad -who had called himself Pelican Crossing- was too busy picking me up from school every Tuesday to tour. Still, his remaining fans took their pension and bought the album, some Murray Mints and a teenth and got down to his noisily recorded acoustic tunes.

All this would be a footnote in musical history if it were not for one Trick Trubin, the number 1 Rick Rubin cover-producer in history (because we all know that technically Ben Folds does not count). Trubin's motto is, if people go to see cover-bands, why the hell not cover-producers? After a spell failing to act and sound like Bongwater heavyweight Mark Kramer, Trubin gave up, grew a beard, found an old man and started mimicking Rubin. With My Granddad signed up to the project Trubin requested that he record a cover version of "March of the Pigs", meditating on extreme old age, third rate industrial punk and, um, marching pigs. He played it to Rory Palmer, but he didn't much like it.

With that in the can, Trubin demanded the plane fare back to America and has never been seen again. My Granddad does not mind, at least he got to relive the glory days by making Trubin sleep in his densely packed and trinket filled cramped spare room.

! Planned Outage

2009-05-15T07:56:00.003+01:00

YHNH will not be publishing any new items between 00:00 and 23:59 on Saturday 16 May 2009.

This is planned outage due to the annual and predictable rift in the reality-satire vortex. For more information about the rift and how it may affect your ability to tell bizarre humour from reality, please click here.

Eurovision 2009 Special!

2009-05-14T20:46:00.006+01:00

Yes! It is that time of year again when Europe's finest pick their most talented to represent them at THE only premier Europe-based music competition in May. The quality is always high and it's a veritable feeding ground for those new music spotters out there. If there was an I Spy Book for bands You Have Not Heard this would be the time to purchase it/dust it down from the bookshelf/steal it from your local book emporium. Sharpen your pencil and prepare for some big fifty pointers!

The competition has a habit of bringing new bands and artists to the attention of the fine peoples of Europe. Frankly, it's like 'You Have Not Heard The Musical' and this year's entries are no exception. Portugal are the early favourites. The group are Abracadaver, the song is 'Death by Keytar' and the performance is a macarbre affair which sees lead singer Ernesto Negro appear from a coffin made of parma violets to a slap bass symphony that just won't quit.

Hosts Russia look strong again this year with 'For Christ's Spake'. Moscow dynamo and former airport somebody, Jeremy Spake, will be strutting his stuff dressed as the son of God himself. His commanding perfomance promises to convice us to 'fish on the otherside' and will no doubt sway a few of those doubting Thomases. Oisky-poisky indeed!

The halftime show is currently a closely guarded secret. Don't expect any Irish dance stilt walker nonesense this year though. Early rumors that Silvio Berlesconi will be appearing on stage with performing the quick step with Randy Newman are largely thought unfounded. Silvio was spotted backstage at Tuesday night's semi-final but has since confirmed that he was simply talent scouting for the recently vacated position of Energy Minister in his cabinet.

So tune in on Saturday night, crack open some 9% Burgerbrau and a bratwurst and vote for your favourite. Alternatively watch 'Helicopter Warfare' (Channel Five at 9pm) or 'When Funeral's Go Bad 4' (Bravo at 10pm) The choice is yours!

Other notable entries in this years Eurovision include:

The Patrick O'Gold Singers -Ireland 5/1
Polska! Polka! -Poland 8/1
Bing Bang Bong - Ecuador 20/1
Plato's Potato - Greece 50/1
David Jason and the Mock Tudors - UK 100/1
Vous, Moi et Tim - France 250/1
Juego de la Carne de Vaca -Spain 300/1

#22 Nine2Five™

2009-05-10T20:05:00.174+01:00

Now, we don't make a habit of these things but our next 'band' that You Have Not Heard are in fact a multi-sex pop group - Nine2Five™. The group conform to the the classic three girl/two boy combo that has worked wonders in the past for such acts as The Michaela Strachan Quintet, VelcroLuv and the Nolans.

Just in pure pop cliché terms Nine2Five do not disappoint. The group comprise Steven McBrandybutter (the one with the comedy surname and former MenyMen star), Sarah Tomson (the one of possible non-descript sexual orientation), Rich Davies (the up-himself, smug one) , Bryony Rangers (the token ethnic minority) and Rachel Galloway (the busty pin-up). Of course, clichés aside, who's to say that other members won't turn out to be gay, black and/or busty at some point in the future.

All five of Nine2Five appeared in the tv show of the same name, Nine2Five - their name coming from the process by which they were selected. Nine were hand-picked from modeling agencies, Hooters restaurants and kebab strewn gutters up and down the country, by music media mogul Flavio Jackanory. Week-by-week, fatal accident after fatal accident the nine were reduced to five, all under the perspicacious gaze of the public and celebrity judges Brian Blessed, Ainsley Harriott and Terry Wogan's gardener. In the early stages of the competition Nine2Five narrowly beat Norwegian novelty act PoopOnPop (so titled due to an administrative error) and F*email to the crown of MTV6's 'Band or Bust' title in November 2008.

The irony of their name is not lost on the group who fully admit to never having done an honest days work in their lives. Indeed, before joining the group three of the five were in office jobs where they would steal biros and paperclips. Steven on the other hand is effectively televisual royalty as his mother is the third cousin of Moscovite dynamo and love child of Phil Jupitus - Jeremy Spake.

At the end of 2008 the group quickly became synonymous with everything great about MTV6 - up there with the series one repeats of 'PimpMyRide Canada' and 'Michael Barrymoore's New American Best Friend'. The five loved the ready money advertising brought in and were soon endorsing everything from their own pasta sauce to air fresheners so sweet smelling Paul would be doing a poo at your house.

Their Christmas number one 'Let's All Have a Nine2Five Christmas' reached the surprisingly credible #53 position in the charts on 25 December 2008. It was just unfortunate that a nine to five Christmas would in fact be disappointingly short and would only leave one hour fifty minutes merriment following the Queen's speech. It is equally astonishing that the song placed so well considering the lyrics that suggested we should all go and 'Abandon your place of worship, it's worth it, take out an Amex, and buy a big Lexus'. 'You can't spell Jeezus without us!' they retorted.

2009 album 'Poptronica' is expected for release at the end of June. Don't hold your breath though. Not only does it reduce the vital oxygen supply to your brain but it is thought that Flavio Jackanory has already moved onto his next project - Crufts on Ice. Each doggie competitor will not only have to display, among other things, a glossy coat and hocks of steel, but they will have to perform a three minute pairs routine. All on ice. The rumour mill continues to grind it's way to a miserable halt with the news that Sarah is thought to be appearing on 'Ukraine's Next Top Model 2009'. Whilst Rich is odds on favourite to host 'Animal Match-ups 7' in which the world's most fearsome beasts meet in a fight to the death. The seventh series is set to be the most interestingly gory to date with Tiger v Narwhal, 6 Squirrels v 2 rabbits and even some Zebra v Heron action.

The way forward is clear for Nine2Five develop or die. It's not about the music. Clearly it never was. It was all about unleashing raw young talent onto the nation in 3 minute musical bite sized pieces. Who knows what the five will be doing next? - perhaps one of them will appear on Holby City as impailed man number three or may even be filmed getting out of a car with no suitable undergarments on. Who knows and frankly who cares?
I'm off to deficate on Paul's doorstep.

#21 The Tendency Movement

2009-05-10T14:36:00.007+01:00

Bad buskers bumbling through blithely; there was little to be said for the unassuming acoustic rockers Mark Umbers and Matthew Flynn. That was until one rainy Saturday, when they set their pitch up Barrack Way, Coventry and were never the same again.

Opening their soft gig bags and placing a small amount of change inside to act as a hint, they adopted the position you would adapt if you were to start to play a chord. Immediately a small group of polite people wearing lovely red badges approached them. One member of the group, older and more stressed looking than the rest explained that this was their spot, that they spend every Saturday here and that they had already erected their plastering table. This raggedy bunch of activists were not going to move and Umbers and Flynn decided to go somewhere else rather than be blasted by the "warning siren" mode on their adversary's megaphone . They were thanked and what appeared to be a newspaper was thrust into Flynn's open hand.

The next week, as the Unwaged Workers Party unloaded their leaflets on avoiding unnecessary paper waste, Umbers and Flynn returned. The group gathered, expecting another showdown. Umbers and Flynn however explained that they had taken the paper away, read every single word (including the Sport and TV Reviews (Crimewatch, 0/5 stars, no understanding of who the "Real Crooks" are)) and come to the conclusion that they had to join The Party. Quizzed on their motivation by Hugo Hands, they explained in length that The Party was referred to with capitals because it was a proper noun and that there was no apostrophe as The Party was for the workers and not owned by the workers. Accepted as equals they were told to get on with asking people to sign a petition calling on Lemon Harvesters to strike over the irresponsibly named Market for Lemons theory.

Weeks of struggle and invective followed, with Umbers being able to take to the microphone to explain to the passing shoppers that "Parliament was built on a dung-heap, and the best thing it can do is sink into it". Flynn managed to convince many of his passing friends to sign a petition supporting the Fifth Durutti Column in their efforts to liberate the people of Basingstoke from eating lunch at their desks. The local Party leader's noticed the pair's ability to mobilise their apparently huge group of friends and asked them if there was anyway they could think of to activate this into full-on support.

Umbers and Flynn pretended to think hard about this and the next week they suggested a gig where they could play. The Tendency Movement was born in Coventry's Motor Hall, compered by the legendary Motor "Mouth" Al. The firebrand new socialists played their hit-strewn set to their baying friends and comrades. Hits such as "On the edge of the Cliff", "Yigael remember you when you're gone" and "We'd all like to forget the idea of a permanent war economy." Not since the Salvation Army's own Joystrings did an ideological movement have such a cogent and well thought through pop band at it's side. Releasing they had to capitalise on this lucky fate, Hugo and the other leaders offered The Tendency movement whatever they wanted.

The Tendency Movement wanted the spot on Barrack Way.

Realising that they had been duped (but that the band had somehow subsumed their ideas into the music) the leadership committee appealed to the central command structure, known informally as The Core. As any member of the UWP party can tell you democracy is held in the highest order in The Party. In the Core election, each local group elects a delegate to the conference, who vote on a list of 10 representatives for the future Core chosen by the 10 members of the current Core. The delegates can either choose to elect this group or be thrown out of the Party. Like Winston Churchill said: "Democracy is the worst idea, until you consider that I'm a raving lunatic who should never have been elected in 1951."

However, the local leadership had not counted on the sneakiness of the Movement, who had promised Core member Patch Snatch the drummer's stool if he backed them. Snatch managed to grab the initiative and convince The Core that the complaining rank and file members should be purged.

On getting his letter Hugo let a little tear fall down his face. Loyal to the last, he even appreciated not being able to appeal.

The Tendency Movement played on, securing a larger and larger fanbase and recording hits as diverse as "I disagrees with John Rees" and "Oi! Kinnock, give us back our raise!"

#20- The Gaffer Tapes

2009-05-05T17:11:00.008+01:00

No Pub Rock band ever managed to accidentally mimic mid sixties New York minimalism quite as successfully as The Gaffer Tapes. Their uncompromising and rigid approach to chord, tone and timbre set them apart from even their more extreme peers and made their once-promising careers flounder and crash. Where once the band stood firm, tough and adhesive, now only a sticky residue remains.

Incensed by the neo-prog music of Bunny F and the flailing locks of Rick Wakeman (officially The Most Hated Man in 1970s Music 19 years running (Jees, even his website stinks)) Martin "Ron"Wheatcroft and Errol "Eric" Bamford set about trying to reconnect music with the average working Joe. Joe was from Conisbrough and had the added advantage that he could play most of the drums. Snares gave him problem but the group reconciled this by declaring the snare drum to be too hoity toity for them anyway. "The kind of thing you'd see Sea Scouts Rattling on," declared a drunk Bamford in an interview in 1973.

Looking for a way to present simple, easy music for simple men and easy girls, Wheatcroft hit on the National Readership Survey classification of social grades. The band talked frankly at only wanting to be of interest to people in the C2, D and E grades. Surely then -so the tortured logic goes- they could only use these chords in all of their songs. D and E were easy enough -they would just play the major chords- but a problem presented itself when the band realised that C2 was only a pompous (and therefore excluded) term for Cadd9. They would not be prepared to work with just a jumped up, one name not good enough, double-barrelled, "look at moi" chord and so decided that they would instead work with the much more working class C7 and C5. C7 minus C5 was, of course, um, C2.

With the correct 4 chords in place the band decided that they could create songs for the first album. Naming each song after the chord combination used within proved somewhat difficult (especially as C7 and C5 were taken as a pair and the group allowed no deviation) but they had just enough permutations for a short but intense 6 song album. The tracklisting can be worked out using Key Stage 4 maths, but for those unlucky enough still to contend with this, the tracks were:

C7 C5, D, E (2:13)
C7 C5, E, D (3:12)
D, C7 C5, E (1:32)
D, E,C7 C5 (2:31)
E, C7 C5, D (3:21)
E, D, C7 C5 (1:23)

The album was assisted by the engineer being slightly deaf. Placing the potentiometer a little too high on every take, the music was beset by rich overtones and bizarre ringing noises at seemingly (and actually) random intervals. About half way through making the album Wheatcroft began to complain that the others were not playing the same chords as him. When they explained that Bamford was rooting the chords on his bass and Joe was playing the drums, Wheatcroft pulled a fit and stated that he was very close to declaring them "musical" and therefore out of the band.

Wheatcroft's suggestion was for Bamford to play the same chord on his bass as Wheatcroft was on his guitar and for the drums to be tuned to the same set of notes, so that Joe could switch between them and match the chords. The result is that from track 3 (D, C7 C5, E) onwards the band were trying to play exactly the same notes at the same time. Waterboarded logic but actually a lovely way to make increasingly good music.

The working men's clubs and smaller pubs in the greater-Doncaster were not impressed and showed this by turning the fruit machines up to a very high level. Bootleg copies of one gig where this happened (at the Warmsworth Arms, Woolworth Street, Warmsworth) started appearing at the more popular underground noise fayres, jamberees and carnivals. People schooled on The Theatre of Eternal Music listened and considered the work B- at best, with the fruit machine's version of the Steptoe and Son music gaining the most positive reviews. Still, the band managed to sell a few albums off the back of the resulting confusion and it allowed them time to contemplate what to do next.

Ever eager to ostracise and denounce inanimate objects and theoretical notions, Wheatcroft decided that the next album should be so easy to listen to that there should be only one chord, played through the whole album. The rest of the band grudgingly agreed and tried not to look too bored when he said that "only the intellectual and the poseur are interested in change." The resulting album "Mrs E's Beautiful Booze" relied on the whole band playing E major for 76 minutes -just enough to get a double album out of it. This time there were no "problems" with the recording sound and this time the revellers at Rotherham's bawdier hostelries realised they were watching something immense. Sounding like a runaway train recorded from the drivers perspective, the amounting wreck was to change the group dynamic and put an end to the insanity.

Realising that this was not what they had signed up for, Bamford and Joe decided to enlist in the French Foreign Legion. Before they knew it, they were sent off to fight in the Chadian-Lybian Conflict, defending Ati from wave after wave of brave but ultimately underarmed FROLINAT fighters. Joe had previously wondered why the words coup d'état were in French. He was confused no more and he became demoralised by what appeared to be hollow victory after hollow victory. Eventually, seeing nothing left for the average man to do, he became a playwright, extolling world peace and brotherhood between men in increasingly poor plays.

Unable to cope without Joe, their "voice of the workingman, taken recently to offering intellectual and petit-proletarian solutions," as Wheatcroft sentimentally rebuked, the band had little option but to change their names and identities. Bamford took to cleaning windows with a very large pole, which was going nowhere until the recent high-rise housing boom. He is now a millionaire, but not a multi-millionaire. Wheatcroft shouts at pigeons in the high street and is often told to move on by the constabulary.

#19 Capeloaf

2009-05-03T09:55:00.121+01:00

Having to make up a one word band name using two existing words is surely the last resort of any aspiring musicians and straightaway firmly places the band on minus 10 on the creativity scale. Not that it is an uncommon practice, even outside music, to conjoin existing words because you don't have the imaginative where-with -all to come up with something half-decent yourself.

Take the seahorse for example. Most mythical creatures have great names; the minotaur, the griffin...so why is the seahorse any different? Yes, I know it's supposed to look like a horse with the bodily functions and water based needs of a fish - sort of like a mermaid and yes, fair enough they exist (we have all seen Tom Hanks getting it on with one in 'Splash'). But has anyone actually seen a seahorse? No. So what do they know. Unfortunately music is no different.

There are plenty of examples out there, making music as we speak. Some of you may have even been to one of their gigs - to those people I say go wash yourself thoroughly.
-Wolfmother - no one is convinced that you suckled baby lupine whelps. Get a better name.
-Coldplay - just because your name is nonsensical that doesn't make you good. Worse still, rumour has it that Keane gave it to you, as they were going to use it, but get this - thought it sounded too depressing. Dear Lord!
-Supertramp - actually that's quite cool. Who can't identify with a super-hero hobo?

And so we come to Capeloaf.

Worst. Band. Name. Ever.

Ok, so it's not as bad as '...And The Pasties' or 'The Noon Landings' but it's definitely up there. To reiterate - completely nonsensical band names are fine (eg 'The Flugalitarians' or 'Transbestite'). Using two words to make a new one is not.

With that out of the way we come to the band themselves. And, oh dear they certainly lived up to the quality of their name. From 1987 to 1993 they consistently pedaled out nu-wave pop dross that would make every single member of the Inspiral Carpets' turn in their graves and REM's 'Shiny Happy People' sound like a 6 hour dirge in memoriam of a deceased puppy, as written by Joy Division.

The group never released a song during their six years together. Gigging exclusively in the Kirby Bedon/Swainsthorpe area of Norfolk they failed to live up to their early promise as respectable grunge-core rockers, then called The F Elevens. On the face of it it seems to be the old story of band gets more than twenty fans, band sells out to make it big. Unfortunately the F Elevens never had as many as twenty fans. They were therefore destined to spend the rest of their careers selling out, but having no fans who would care that it was happening. One might question just whether this is really selling out, given no one knew who they were in the first place. To them I say yes, yes it is. It took six years before the group realised that no one cared. Despite a good write up in the Norwich Evening News in 1989 and having offered free food and drink at every single one of their 2,986 gigs (including, at various stages, six different volauvents, a Mediterranean seafood buffet and a medieval banquet). No one came.

What can you say about a band that had nothing and threw it all away. Not alot. Other than that they should have considered a managed and sustainable recycling scheme for their guitar-based-indie-pop-tat. You only need to look at what 'In Stew We Trust' were doing in the early nineties - bitesized manageable slices of pop intertwined with noise solos and a cute female bassist in a short skirt. Just like the scraps you get offered on your fish and chips Capeloaf seem like a great idea at the time but there's really nothing to them and they are 63% more likely to give you a heart attack.

Happy guitar pop doesn't come much happier. Capeloaf on the other hand are frankly yeast-erday's news.

Dudley Music and Dance Festival 2009 line-up announced!!

2009-04-29T17:28:00.000+01:00

This year's Dudley Music and Dance Festival 2009 is set to be the biggest ever and features a veritable plethora of bands that you have not heard. As well as old favourites such as The Sock Puppets and Lady Gravy, and unlike previous years, there will be a wealth of side attractions including a man with a wind up music box and monkey on a lead, fire-eaters and public conveniences.

The festival, which takes place on the weekend of 29 and 30 August 2009, is traditionally held on the last weekend of August, and this year is no exception. Dudley's own Pilkington Class will be headlining the Saturday night followed by Pious Goliath on the Sunday. Both will be gracing the Black Country Living Museum main stage, scene of last year's 'Sheepgate' scandal.

This year the festival goes international with some surprising late additions to the line-up. They may only have a combined age of 16 but boy can they dance; Bhangra Babies will be appearing on Saturday afternoon. A hard act to follow you might think, but if one band can do it it's Austrian pop favourites Housewerk, appearing on the Trevor and Anne Drinkwater Stage.

The festival has been known for its ability to attract the unlikeliest of celebrity guests to open the proceedings. Previous conscripts have included Dale Winton, Lassie and the Milky Bar Kid. 2009's celebrity is being kept very much under wraps, but if you were to say Margaret Mountford from hit TV show The Apprentice you wouldn't be far wrong.

With a 6 yard hog roast and gallons of real ale on tap even the most tone deaf, sandal and sock wearing, imperial loving members of the population will be content. So, if this blog has given you a taste for new music and bands that just shouldn't exist come along to Dudley Music and Dance Festival 2009*. Tickets on sale soon.

*Dudley Music and Dance Festival 2009 is not affiliated with the town of Dudley, music, dance or the year 2009

#18 The Gentle Welephants

2009-04-26T18:15:00.001+01:00

'Never play with naked flames - when your house burns down it's you they'll blame'. We all remember the little moral ditties that spouted from the trunk of the living legend and mascot of fires brigades up and down the country - Welephant. Since 1985 the anthropomorphic pachyderm has spread tales of mirth and fiery Armageddon that would leave children afraid to cook, and some so mentally scarred they would never again change a lightbulb. This tends to explain why, over twenty years later, large swathes of the population spend each and every night in darkened rooms eating Pot Noodle. Despite Welephant being the single cause of Britain's 'obesity problem' the love for this most rubicund of mastodons is well publicised. Two young lads from inner-city Salford took their love one step further by naming their band after him.

The year was 1987 and Billy Jenkins and Tugger Harris were in year 4 at St Theophilius of Bulgaria Comprehensive School. Wagon Wheels were as big as your head, you could buy Monster Munch by the pint and Grange Hill was still yet to become the poor descheveled uncle of Byker Grove. Whilst most kids were watching endless re-runs of Dungeons and Dragons and a mutant orange Geordie with a sore throat on You and Me, Jenkins and Harris were busying themselves with their passion for tracksuits and music.

Being only nine, living in Salford and harbouring an interested in hip hop all have their disadvantages. So it was that the majority of the boy's friends were listening to mournful guitar-based tat of The Smiths. Whilst their mates were fawning over the elitist melancholy of the band, Jenkins and Harris took an immediate dislike to every thing they stood for. In protest the pair sent hate mail to Morrissey written on meat-based products. It is not known whether the hapless superstar ever received the edible vituperation, but what we do know is the campaign was sustained for a number of months and culminated in a pork postcard.

Neither of the lads had touched an instrument before but Morrissey's incessant whining and flower swinging drove them on to make music. Due to their total lack of musical ability Jenkins and Harris began by taping the chart hits of the day from PopPix Radio on a Sunday night (just before jammie-time, beans on toast dinner and Antiques Roadshow). Using a complex mixing process, which mainly involved scissors, copious amounts of sticky tape and Tugger's pet hamster Trevor, they sampled and remixed the hits all with the aid of a Spectrum ZX. The results were frankly underwhelming. Despite this, T-Dog and Billy Braggs, as they became known, were an overnight success in the playground. The next morning they sold at least six tapes to their friends (although most went to Gary Brinkley in year 6 who used them to tie up the year twos. Also, for 'sold' read 'swapped for two packets of Space Raiders and a conker that looked like Terry Rowntree's Mum').

The next Monday they felt they had to top the previous week's effort. However, it was the duo's decision to remix the entire back-catalogue of Jive Bunny and the Mastermixers that was just that one step too far for their classmates. As with all schoolyard crazes like yo-yos, hammocks and wellington boots in the shape of kittens, the duo were dropped as quickly as they were discovered. Ironically, and in a cruel twist of fate, the tapes were confiscated by Mrs Davies, who re-recorded over them with the educational radio programme 'Fire. Natures Conflagrant Killer'. If only, instead of thinking Jive Bunny was 'quite rad', T-Dog and Braggs had remembered those fateful words of Mr Welephant himself: 'If you play with flame and fire, a criminal record you'll acquire'. A criminal record it certainly was.

Of course, we all know the rest of the story - Welephant was sold to an ivory dealer by the Fire Brigade to cover losses on their latest sexy calendar and the boys disappeared into obscurity. T-Dog received good grades on his o-levels, his nana was very pleased, and he now works as a chartered accountant. Despite almost losing his life in a nasty British Bulldog incident in 1989, Braggs is now a Management Consultant but says he is happy.

#17 Mega Pea Sea

2009-04-26T15:22:00.001+01:00

Imagine two good things; things that can be accessed from the same magical box. Imagine just how good that would be. As long as you didn't mind paying more than you would for the two things individually, it was a great way to have stuff together in one box.

I am of course talking about the mighty Mega Pea Sea, the first band to give you a choice of whether you wanted soulful swing or electrobeat stylings, all for just £24 an album. Started as the brainchild of William F Stewart -a Glasgow busker with a penchant for the absurd and overpriced- the band started as a child does: with a brain that goes into the child to become the brainchild of the brain and the child, with the brain using the child as a child and the child using the brain as a brain. Gathering his friends together for a unforgettable night of open mic music and poetry, Stewart explained that he would mix hitherto unmixed things not to create a new or imaginative musical source, but to give people the choice about what they wanted to listen to. The ensembled musicians quickly realised the sense in the nonsense: with a choice of musical styles to listen to, they could attract more people to buy the music.

Even though the Nobel Prize for Economics is not even a Nobel prize at all, were the selection committee less blinkered in their thinking there could be no doubt that Stewart would win every year. The first album's title, Slide the Slider, was both a fabulous encapsulation of the music that could be found within, but was also a handy guide for how to listen to both sets of music on the album. Further tightening his grip on the suffering fans, along with the album, they also had to purchase a new CD player (RRP £495) with a sliding front. The CD set came as a pair and one CD had to be placed into each of the twin drives on the front. When played you would be able to listen to one of the CDs but also change the CD immediately by "Sliding the Slider."

In the hands of a more interesting and interested band, the music would match up, or somehow relate to one another, making Sliding the Slider a groundbreaking and wonderful thing to do. As it was, the band just chose to compose music that would seem fit in a garage forecourt or mall elevator. For both sides. The only redeeming quality was that the swing side featured out of work child prodigy Gimnel Mastadon on trumpet and trombone (simultaneously). Given two hours of studio time and a list of notes that were not to be used (to prevent any possible costly copyright infringements) Mastadon felt he had to perform microtonal, contrapunctual music on his two instruments at the same time, whilst keeping with the general ethos of swing music. The resulting sound has been noted by noted music historians as sounding like "a ménage à trois in a menagerie."

In the hands of a less greedy band, the CD players would have lasted more than one play without succumbing to heating issues. Alternatively, fans stated it would have been nicer to be able to play the CDs individually on a normal CD player even if this did mean not being able to switch between them. Stewart claimed artistic differences with his fans and kept taking their money for a new CD player every time they wanted to listen to the music.

The second album, Slides and Swings and Roundabouts, featured a new CD player with a sliding front, a jog wheel and a large, carefully balanced switch. Although very few people were fooled by these cosmetic inclusions (the switch was the on/ off button and the jog wheel didn't do anything at all), they were still forced to spend £788 a time on listening the album as it also worked only on this player. Fans moaned and groaned but they still couldn't push the heat out of the system and the player almost always broke before Mastadon's soaring second half solo, using lilting swing riffs and mixing them with heavily theoretical phrasing. It was a magnificent edifice, available only to those with enough money and liquid nitrogen to keep the overpriced player going.

Eventually Mastadon got tired of Stewart's money grabbing, especially when Stewart signed a deal with Woolworths, giving them sole selling of the player for the next item in their "Big Book." "It's just a rip-off of Argos," Mastadon is reported as saying, before leaving in a huff.

Without their main draw, Mega Pea Sea never could regain the interest of the very high price purchasing public. Their sales floundered and then dropped. Bobby Fischer refused to be used as a ringer for Mastadon and the band decided to go their separate ways. Stewart is now a regular caller to Talk Radio, drunkenly stating that he is the only one who can tell good swing from bad swing and that "Celtic have got no chance of winning on Saturday." Mastadon now prefers not talking about this period and is happier giving relatively accurate valuations of treasured family possessions with almost interesting stories on Antiques Roadshow.

#16 Wallarula Death Squad

2009-04-21T17:39:00.000+01:00

"Where the bloody hell are you?" exclaims the latest expletive-ridden advert attempting to entice us to the land of barbeques and the world's most famous natives. Where? Well to be exact, the wilds of the Australian outback somewhere between Katunganuga and Tijikala in the desert just off Highway 4. The town of Wallarula, population 23.

So it is that we dip into the southern hemisphere for our next band that You Have Not Heard - and I know that you have not heard of Wallarula Death Squad. I am certain. I would go so far as to say that you also haven't heard of front-man Jib Spinnaker whose solo career before joining WDS was a minor success in the Northern Territory and periphery. Yet he never really gained commercial success despite his songs appearing on adverts for many meat-based products.

So, as if conducting some sort of weird scientific experiment we ask 'what type of band forms under such conditions - where the nearest toilet is six days walk and where you have to wring out passing koalas just to get clean water?' The answer, surprisingly, is a traditional four piece indie pop-rock band. No, they haven't re-recorded Waltzing Matilda in comedy or electro-pop fashion. No, they have never dueted with Rolf Harris or Dame Edna Everage (although they did once appear as extras on 'Home and Away' but that's as far as it goes). What they have done is produce some of the finest 3 minute breezy indie pop tunes ever heard this side of Rulatunga. Not bad for a band who are only one EP old.

Wallarula Death Squad are quickly making their name on the Oz-rock scene. Playing the first five years together as 'Son of Chaucer' then 'Herculian Botham' the four-piece have a work hard /play middle of the road indie pop-moderately hard ethic that is incredibly endearing. Spinnaker performs alongside local musicians Lchalan Langridge (drums), Molly Allen (bass) and Jackson B Rockafella (lead guitar). By nature their songs are entrenched in Australian lore and culture. Songs such as 'Lord of the Rings - not in my backyard' and 'Fair Dinkum Freddie' evoke visions of strange bird mammal hybrids, Flying Doctors and that episode of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air where Carlton beats Geoffrey the butler over the head with a Vegemite sandwich (he knows that Carlton only eats it with the crusts cut off). It didn't all start smoothly though...

Currently based in local Lake Amaroo, the band's name came about when Spinnaker found himself in trouble with loan sharks back in Wallarula: 'I was really in some deep dodo with these guys from the suburbs', he explains. 'I mean, I owed these cats some real money. They sent this bloke out after me with a table knife - they call him the Wallarula Death Squad. Strewth, I saw where this was going, and before we got into the old 'that's not a knife' malarkey I shot him in the face hole'. With the debt repaid, change and receipt in hand, Spinnaker was free to continue with his musical exploits and quickly formed Wallarula Death Squad, naming it so to remind himself never to borrow as much as ten dollars ever again.

WDS's first single is currently number 26 in the Australian music charts, with high hopes that it will reach the top twenty by September '09. It faces stiff competition from fellow antipodeans Air Supply with 'All Out of Love' which holds every spot in the Australian top twenty and has done since its release back in 1980. The track, which appears on their EP 'Death to Wallarula Death Squad', is a moving yet summery and upbeat tale of a boy and his deceased pet toucan on which Jib laments: 'There are no synonyms for death, but there are plenty of antonyms...'. The EP was released in November '08 to critical acclaim. Their album 'The Ballad of Terry Cola' is due to be released in August '09 under Control Alt Deloitte Records, Australia's third biggest aboriginal record label. The album will be produced by US music industry stalwart Vic Biro, famed for his work with both Tepid Lettuce and Monkey Jeff and the PoCo Cops.

Talk of Biro's involvement has had an amazing effect on hyping-up the release of the album. At the time of writing early reviews of their debut album appear promising;

'(The Ballad of Terry Cola)...could make Wallarula Death Squad as big as Men at Work' gushed MTVOz.

'Like drinking six cans of four x and then smashing yourself over the head with a wallaby's uncle' say Australian NME.

High praise indeed. The group have a long way to go before they emulate the likes of Jet and Savage Garden but one thing is certain, and that is Aussie rules!*

Footnote
(*For reference no one is really certain what Aussie Rules is, so that's a poor analogy. But meh, you get the picture).

#15 - The Purloin Cloth

2009-04-21T14:22:00.000+01:00

Many bands have tried to invent themselves as characters and draw a fanbase from a twenty-something form of dress-up. No band relished and descended into this world as thoroughly and as stupidly as The Purloin Cloth. Donning the ruffs of Elizabethan ruffians, these nogoodnicks would rather get into a fight with an inkeeper's mistress than watch back to back episodes of CSI: Prestwich on a 42" plasma screen.

Formed following the demise of Toga-wearing Time Bandits fans Two Speed, Robert "Og" Carrot and Jasper "Wally" Powell took their bass and drums and sat by the river, hoping inspiration would waft by. After a little while they noticed a bizarre man hunting around along the riverside, acting in all honesty as if he was a mudlarker. The rhythm section quickly took to talk to this new chap and he explained it all started when he was all for his GCSE history project on the World's Worst Jobs. Oh, how he sighed, if only somebody could do a Sunday evening programme on the World's Worst Job, mildly entertaining and informative, then he could just use that as research. As it was, he had to ferret around in silt and worse mess looking for some coins. After a while, though, he came to enjoy the life of a mudlark, particularly the larking part as well as -on occasion- the mud part.

Robert and Jasper realised that they could use this kind of nonsense for their act, if maybe only they selected another period in history which didn't require being covered in excrement. Sure enough, they found in the British Library a selection of Elizabethan dramas so exciting and naughty that they could barely contain themselves. They were going to become cant speaking, penny nicking, barfight instigating Elizabethan thieves.

Finding a guitarist ready to step into a ready-made band was not a particularly hard job. Frank "Sewell" Cottam was lazy and suggestible even for a guitarist. He had once been convinced by local children to sit in a bath filled with red noses for two hours in the hope of meeting Hale and Pace. This was obviously a prank and Cottam only got to meet Cannon and Ball, who the children had managed to book by offering their manager the taxi fare home. Cottam was drafted in and made to wear the tightest knee-length socks money could buy.

The Purloin's first album, "Groatsworth of Wit" followed the life and death of author Robert Greene (1558-1592), especially in comparison to the (in their eyes) hopelessly inferior life of Robert Greene (b. 1959), the author of books, including planned work with 50 Cent. A normal song would start with some era-accurate keyboard playing (described by at least one critic as being "strongly virginal") followed by a cacophony of clanking guitars, bass and most of the time some drums. The band aesthetics really came into the fold and Powell would often be found looking at himself in the mirror instead of keeping beat. Eschewing the Internet in favour of individually inked pamphlets, the group became a hit in parts of London where that kind of thing is accepted as somehow legitimate.

Their live and on-record personas started to take flight and they were barely seen out of costume. Were it not for the pettiness of their misdemeanors (and the saving grace of inflation and decimalisation) the band may have found themselves in prison long before the second album came out; they would often pickpocket locals and steal one or two pence, declaring it a "Kings Ransom", before running off to the alehouse to ask what they would get for it. When they were informed, in slightly more colourful language, that they could not receive much for twopence, they often muttered some nonsense about price increasing due to the King of Spain's massing Flotilla, doffed their filthy cap at any ladies present and left the building.

The second album, "Hautboy" pushes the boundaries of what a group of people in their mid twenties can achieve by acting like prats. They hired the whole Early Music Ensemble from The University of Cheam to play clapping games. This was supposedly to highlight Elizabethan rhythmic devices. Whilst the Ensemble were eating their lunch the band ran off with the more expensive instruments. They hid in a skip and were collected by some fellow rotters who assisted them in spiriting the instruments away for the Greater London area. Having a full set of Elizabethan instruments made Hautboy much more musically gratifying, even if the band were not experts at playing them. It also allowed them to use the line on their press kit that no instrument on the album had been designed after 1592. The press love that kind of crap and the album went straight in at number 3. Cheam never did get their instruments back, a botched recovery mission lead to the deaths of 3 paratroopers and a slightly bent crumhorn. Eventually it was decided to call in the insurers, who instigated a cover-up.

Sadly, Cottam was stabbed through the eye in what was at the time reported to be an assassination attempt connected to his international espionage. Recent research has suggested that this was more likely a bar fight over who was to pay the tab. The band never recovered and have not written a note together since. Although Cottam survived, his near-death experience pushed him towards greater independence and self-control, making the centre of the group fall apart around him.

Carrot and Powell are engaged in talks with 50 cent in order to publish a book about comparative life on the streets in the 1580s and present.

Newsflash! Chick in a Basket to split, maybe.

2009-04-17T07:34:00.000+01:00

News is approaching YHNH Towers of the end of one of history's greatest Polka-Funk-Fusion bands. Chick in a Basket's 2nd seat drummer Chick "Chris" Trick has leaked (off the record and on lobby rules, of course) that the band has oboe'd it's last waltz to the old timers at the stop-n-strut off highway 7723. Rumours have abounded that the band was to split since Chick "Chas" Truck pulled out of their nightly gig with what the group referred to as a classic case of Athelete's Stirrup.

Nobody has been fooled and the photos on the internet of him ingesting live freshwater shark have now re-surfaced. At least one major gossip column has stated that he has returned to his habit of eating freshwater versions of what are normally saltwater animals. At the height of his addiciton he was quoted as saying "I just don't like those little fish that are too good for saltwater. If they can make taffy out of it, you should darned well live in it."

The rest of the group are yet to comment, but we feel it is not too early to publish purient and unsubstantiated rumours.

#14 The Llandudno Border Colliers

2009-04-10T21:52:00.001+01:00

If it's Border Collies in the general Llandudno area you are looking for, see this site. For brash, haughty brass stylings read on...

Rarely has so much been owed by so many to so few. Never more so was that so irrelevant than when considering The Llandudno Border Colliers.

Like most colliery bands the group were an unassuming 30 strong troupe of young local men. Unlike most colliery bands not one member of the group had ever experienced the harsh, relentless reality of chipping away at a coal seam - underground or open cast. The ever controversial Border Colliers were formed in 1913 by the local government as a recreational activity for the workers in the local coal mines. Looking back now it seems surprising that the Council were so slow to realise that the mining community was not well established in Llandudno. This was of course mainly due to the complete absence of coal within a 50 mile radius. Instead, and as a hastily conceived back up plan, the majority of the group were drawn from the employ of the local artificial ski slope - believe it or not the largest in the County Borough of Conwy. Skiing was the lifeblood of the Llandudno economy in the first decade of the 20th century. Indeed it was not only Llandudnites who were drawn to the ski centre, PM David Lloyd George himself was known to be quite a fan of the slippery slope.

With the idea for the group in place the Mayor of Llandudno designed a competition comprising three tests by which a conductor could be selected. The affair started out as simple test of who could hold a baton, who had seen a brass instrument before and who best fitted the suit they had had made. The competition was fierce, one thing led to another and things quickly descended into chaos. Two of the competitors challenged the rest of the group to a race to Paris by the means of motor carriage alone. The three that took up the challenge, who remain nameless in the annals of history, never returned. Six months later, of the original four, local busybody and general gadabout Stanley B Uppington was the only competitor still presumed alive. As if being more alive the then other competitors wasn't enough Uppington had to rely on his immediate family history to win him the coveted role. Uncle Jerry collected tickets on the buses and great-grandfather Gareth worked in the local electrical components factory manufacturing conductors. Uppington was taken on as a ringer at the ski slope and was immediately put in charge of goggles.

The 30 strong group were hand-picked by Uppington himself. Notable amongst his choices was E-flat Tuba which went to five year old shoe shine boy Owen Rhys-Owen and Flugelhorn which was placed in the young, inexperienced hands of one Cefin Van Aled, later of Welsh pirate rockers Peg Leg Ned. The first few years saw the group consolidated as they began to cover the popular songs of the day, including 'My Lass has a Lazy Eye for You', and their highly successful own magnum opus 'It's a Long Way to Llandudno Artificial Ski Incline and Entertainment Rotunda'.

As the First World War approached the members of the band were, one by one, called into service. The Llandudno Council publicly played down the impending conflict claiming it 'just a bit of a to-do' which would 'quickly blow over'. Instead, they acted in the way only they knew how - by continuing to service the ski-based needs of the North Walesian peoples. Of course, history came to prove the Llandudno council correct and within a matter of years all was forgotten. It wasn't long, however, before the group's existence came under threat yet again.

In 1939 Germany invaded Poland. The Colliers knew exactly how to deal with this sort of thing and it wasn't long before the 'Ski for Victory' campaign was launched. The Border Collier's songs became rallying calls for the lads over seas. The most popular was the catchily titled 'Ni shall baffio 'u i mewn 'r bantiau ag 'n brassy chwytha chyrn'. Which, for the non-Welsh speakers amongst you loosely translates as 'We Shall Fight them in the Valleys with our Brassy Blow Horns'. For those who do speak this, the most finest of ancient languages, we apologise. Whether brave conscientious objectors or cowardly brass bunglers is a matter of conjecture to this day. What is of course known is the success in helping to bring a quick end to the conflict through their 'Instruments for Skis' programme. Within months of the outbreak of the war over 56,000 instruments were melted down to make 10,000 pairs of skis. The skis were sent over to the 'brave lads' in France and as far afield as Belgium. You can just picture the scene as yet another pair of skis arrives at the trenches - enough to bring a tear to the most seasoned of battle hardened eyes.

The group continued with the original line up all the way through until 1972 when Stanley B Uppington died, aged 102. The band vowed to continue the work of the previous 60 years despite their increasing frailties and the loss of their mentor and inspiration.

In 1991 the Colliers became one of the many groups banned on the BBC Gulf War black list. They joined such misunderstood luminaries as Lulu ('Boom Bang a Bang' - banned 1991) and The Facist Badgers ('Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Them All' - banned 1992 to present). The group had recently bagged the top spot in the UK easy listening, adult mainstream and contemporary music charts with a collaboration with Welsh music messiah Tom Jones. The song, a rough cut of Tom's later hit 'Sex Bomb', was banned due to its blatant and explicit references to both sex and bombs and possibly also sex with bombs. Weekly light entertainment music magazine show Top of the Pops refused to play the 'hate filled three minute militaria orgy' and filed for an all out BBC ban.

It wasn't until 2001 that the group returned to our screens, as the BBC ban was temporarily lifted. The group were offered their chance for absolution and redemption, as should always be the case one would like to think (unless of course you are talking about Ron Atkinson). The occasion was 'An Evening With New Order' with Jools Holland hosting, as part of his hit tv show 'Later With Jools Holland'. The diminutive, fawning and all out 'boogie-woogie-ing' host, almost soiled his undergarments as the the group marched on, stage right, playing back-up for 'World in Motion'. And yes, as you might have expected, the John Barnes rap was replaced with a zesty Euphonium solo. Public confidence was restored in the group, the song went straight in at number one and once again the band were doing their bit for brass and country.

As with most bands of their ilk the Border Colliers made their name through recreating the popular hits of the day to varying degrees of success. This continued right up until the late 1990s. Ever the innovators they came up with a brassy, instrumental re-working of Primal Scream's 'Swastika Eyes' (performed at the Proms in 1998 no less) and a cheeky re-working of Bob Marley's 'Llandudno Woman, No Cry'. More recently the group set out to undertake a complete brass reworking of the Beastie Boys back catalogue.

None of the group have been seen in public since their heroic 1998 Proms performance. Some say the relentless hounding of the paparazzi had finally taken its toll, others that they are simply so old that people just can't see them any more. One would hope that they will return someday. Maybe next time the country is in apparent danger, like an imminent England exit from a World Cup, or perhaps just when another comedy dictator wants to rule the world. Either way you can bet your brass that The Llandudno Border Colliers will there blowing their hearts out and skiing for victory once again.

#13- The Lentil Weddings

2009-04-04T19:30:00.000+01:00

Some weddings have a DJ playing Frank Sinatra hits on repeat. Some have an ipod belting out alternative indie classix from the 80s and 90s. Catering "Ruth" Crupton and Phirrus "Pip" Gobensmock were not "some" couple.

Their one-time unrecorded gig lives on through the people who attended; mostly confused relatives and serving staff. One particularly cool bus boy spread the word that it was the best thing he heard that day and he'd been at an all-day festival all morning but had to leave to go to work. Soon promoters tried to get the couple to reform, but their approaches were met by silence and confusion from the newlyweds.

Legend has it that the couple spent a long time looking for the type of party band who could switch between appeasing the in-laws by crooning Brat Pack-era Riviera pleasers and slap-bass heavy indie cheese. There were no bands operating in West Yorkshire who came close. With weeks to go and only a limited number of musical instruments, the pair decided to take the job on themselves.

Crupton developed her xylophone skills, incorporating microphone-manipulation, microtonal theory and controllable feedback loops. Gobensmock looked on and fiddled with his guitar.

On the day of the wedding, the rumours say, the couple were married in a big cathedral by a priest and went on to their reception location for sound-check and new world wines. When the engineer had finished his vegetarian cheese souffle they took to the front of the venue and got going. With the resulting chaos caused by a illegitimately sourced flashbang the husband and wife grabbed their instruments and drifted into a cover of Don't You (Forget About Me), crunching through it at a rate of knots only previously achieved by tape manipulation and involuntary electrocution. They sojourned -through a series of clusters Crupton had devised as little as 6 minutes before- into I Remember a Time When Once You Used to Love Me. This eventually fell into an extended noise section whilst Gobensmock asked the toastmaster to fetch him a brandy and cola and a pint of Old Hebbler's Stoic ale. Returning to proceedings the conjugally aligned pair rushed into the only minutemen song they could possibly remember: Bob Dylan Wrote Propaganda Songs. Fearing the audience were about to turn on them, the group then rescued their efforts by playing a xylophone-heavy cover Jermaine Jackson's Words into Action. The Brat Pack loving relatives were impressed enough to stop throwing bottles at their niece and new-nephew in law and order was returned when the couple left to get themselves cleared up.

Perhaps this really happened. Or perhaps a server was bored and annoyed at his mum for making him work when he had an all-day festival planned. Either way, the couple will now not accept calls and will not perform publicly together. Is this a lesson in humility or an over-egged dream, a la the 1986 film Wisdom? We will never know.

#12 Bunny F and the Tarnished Scone

2009-03-30T17:42:00.000+01:00

For over twenty years Bunny F and the Tarnished Scone were the bastions of all that was good about the British regional prog scene. After all it was they who, against all odds and record company cheque books, brought stadium rock and all the pomp and excess that comes with it to the venue at the end of your road. By all accounts they were like the younger, poorer leper brother of 1970s prog rock bands such as The Colossians and The Purple Dishwasher Monkey. However, their music was immensely textural evoking vast soundscapes of light and shade (Bunny F liked to work both with and without the light on) whilst their album artwork screamed 'Magic Eye' years before we knew our peepers were capable of such conjurery.

Bunny F (b. Gregory F Bunnikins), was an eccentric loner millionaire with more money than Scrooge McDuck. (He probably even have enough money to recreate the now infamous swimming through money scene). Not to be outdone by the fictional anthropomorphic Glaswegian duck Bunny F felt both his future and fortune lie in music. In pursuit of his dream he put together a band the like of which has never been seen before, or since. Bunny was joined by Davy Davy (later of the Croquettes), Sid McParadis, Mitch Michaelson and Philip Frincton. Davy Davy provided the backing vocals and bass, Sid was on guitar, Mitch on keyboards and Philip the drums. Having said that all five were multi-instrumentalists who could play everything from the Altotron to the Zither-ree-doo.

Interestingly, the group's moniker was lifted from the pages of an obscure novel by 1960s beat novelist Allen Ginster (later of the processed meat-based pastry products of the same name). 'The Tarnished Scone' was a 300 page masterwork in which the scone itself was a metaphor for the American Dream. Yes, it's well-baked cheesy form looks enticing but is it good for you, and does it really taste that good? The answer is of course yes, yes it does.

BFATTS quickly became famed in the Telford locale for their outlandish stage sets. Indeed, 1972's 'The Rainbow Machine Pats o' Gold Tour' was accompanied by a set that cost over £2,000, which as we all know was 'actually quite alot of money in those days'.

Picture the scene. Chichester Community Music Hall, 15 June 1972. Whilst McParadis holds all the C# notes he can on his six keyboards and Davy Davy hums allegorical haikus about the price of the national shopping basket, a single spotlight appears, tracking an ominous dark shape suspended from the ceiling. The object is a giant piñata shaped like a unicorn, gliding effortlessly over the unsuspecting heads of the audience. The piñata is lowered above the stage, whereupon one hundred and one small children appear dressed as the characters from hit tv show 'Cheers'. Eerily, this in itself was way ahead of its time, as Cheers would not be aired in Britain for another ten years. The miniature Frasier Cranes and Sam Malones, using only their fists (and the more enthusiastic little tots, their heads) begin to beat the mythical horned-pony piñata. In a wonder of 1970s pyrotechnics the unicorn bursts apart, showering the audience with its wondrous contents. The contents of course, that's right, Bunny F, dressed appropriately enough as over-sized confectionery man Bertie Bassett.

Whilst Rick Wakeman was turning in his grave the rest of us basked, revelled and down right wallowed in the keyboard solos so long that there was an interval during each one and the at times cacophonic sounds created by the six flute troupes and chimp string quartet.

1975's album 'Tambourine Submarine' was the very long awaited follow up to the tour. The hook was epic rock symphonies, the premise was a musical underwater odyssey and the execution was lousy. The first single released was 'Quest for the Morose Tapir' on which the group employed some radical methods to get just the sound they wanted. The most elaborate of these were a bespoke triangle the size of two double deckers and a xylophone so big you had to play it with two tree trunks suspended from cranes. Apparently, passing tiny microphones through the bowels of small rodents also proved musically fruitful. The single sold thirty-six copies.

It was at this point that the inevitable cracks began to appear, as they always seem to this far down the page of a band biog. The rest of the group became weary of Bunny's attempts to shock audiences at every turn. The final straw came during the recording of 'Tambourine Submarine', when at Bunny's insistence the band found themselves recreating the underwater scenes of 'Bedknobs and Broomsticks'. Frincton took particular exception to having to don the original outfit as worn by Angela Lansbury which was of course to small for the 5'7 Frincton (It is a little known fact that Lansbury is a colossal 6'3).

Frincton instigated the split to form 'Scone', in an attempt to bring mediocre, prog inspired soft rock to the masses. He released the debut 'You Won't Know What You've Got Until It's Scone' a cheeky, patent swipe at his former band mate. In many ways Scone were everything that Bunny F both despised and desired in equal measure. They went onto countywide critical acclaim. Indeed, when if band's success is measured by whether they had a tribute band it's worth noting that Scone had two - 'Scone Away' and 'Scone But Not Forgotten'.

Having become the pariah of British prog Bunny went into hiding. He would emerge in 1982, proclaiming himself to be 'Prog's Son on Earth' - the resurrection of Peter Gabriel. Gabriel was thought to be less than pleased and went on to write 'Sledgehammer', a little-known and thinly veiled veritable assault on Bunny. Conversely, Scone remained a critical and commercial success releasing 12 albums in 1980 alone. Their latest venture is an ambitious tender for the comeback theme tune for hit eighties tv show 'Challenge Anneka'.

#11- Harbingers of Zoom

2009-03-29T14:09:00.000+01:00

Poor bands buy bad pedals, make them sound good, get lots of money and then buy good pedals. But what if your whole ethos is about bad pedals? Where are you left to go? What do you spend the money on? Harbingers of Zoom found that conflicts of interests can pull you and your friends apart at the seams and leave nothing but slivers of tacking thread on the floor.

Young Michaela Chickenfeed (b.1979, Marton Cum Grafton) worked through the Summer holidays at Goosey's Greengrocers to buy parts for burgeoning interest in the electrified guitar. She had to endure the "Come have a goosey at Goosey's" jingle every 15 minutes for 198 hours but she eventually had enough money to buy a cheap guitar and amp. Enjoying the sounds she could create (including Am and Em7add11) she wondered if there was anything more she can do to the sounds after she made them but before they came out of the amp. She turned the sound up and down using the controls. Trying to play the guitar loud with the amp turned down was fun, as was finger-tapping. But there must be more, she thought.

Back in Goosey's for the Christmas holiday, Michaela had made a decision to purchase the cheapest multi-effect she could find. Her thoughts and dreams turned the to bizarre words she could find on the box: compression, distortion, phaser, volume, autowah. Her grandma gave her an extra £20 for Christmas and by the 27th of December she had a Zoom 505 in her hands. The next week she bought a second line to line cable. The week after that she purchased a 9v battery and/or a DC power adapter. Plugging in her guitar, she instinctively tuned it to C4- Choir Wave. The lapping chorus and flange sent her to a place Billy never could. Two weeks later, Billy had been replaced by Bobby and Bobby could play the bass. Bobby's friend Noddy could play the drums. Noddy's friend Roddy had access to a practise space and his mum didn't ask what that smell was. In a matter of weeks, Michaela had gone from a Goosey's pear-stacker to the figurehead of a striding new force for musical liberation in the greater York area.

Utilising all the creating talent in a 4 mile radius, the band baptised themselves Harbingers of Zoom in a manner not even Jesus Christ thought proper. The regular gig would revolve around the rhythm section knocking out some phat chops whilst Michaela used her inbuilt tuner to check her strings, pressed both pedals to stop the mute and played some open chords whilst switching between b4- Steel China and E2- JAZZY. By their eighth gig they had sculpted the bedrock of their first album, lovingly titled "Zoom Music Girl."

The following biding war was not quite a frenzy; although there was at least 2 contracts on the table at any one time, the A&R people found that they worked for the same company and the one offering the higher amount was suddenly recalled to London and never seen again. Michaela, flush with success celebrated by turning her amp to full and using patch E3- Octave Fuzz until she burst into a little jig.

Looking towards the second album, the band seriously considered buying a 505ii but decided that this would mess with their sound too much. plus there wasn't much difference and they would still have the same number of sounds. Michaela, becoming increasingly erratic would not let anyone else touch her pedal. Convinced that they were going to take it away form her in the night and play with the electronics inside, she would cradle it in bed and not let anyone else spend the night.

The second album, "Christmas at the Zoom" was a holiday-themed spectacle utilising -amongst other patches- C2- Bright Chorus and A2- Clean Delay. Their fans bought the album and put it away until Christmas. Four people resigned from the record company after they released the album in July.

By this time the 707 had been released. Bands up and down the Vale of York were popping into Woolworths and making themselves sound almost as good as the Harbingers. Their success was running away with itself and Michaela -both at the centre of the storm and unaware of what was going on around her- neither knew nor cared that new, fresh bands were using the latest technological accomplishments (including ring modulator-type sounds and a greater number of distortion patches) and making superior music.

Beginning to fall apart, the band booked studio time in order to work on new material. The accounts of these sessions are varied and suffer from what the French somewhat racistly call Le téléphone arabe. Some stories centre on Michaela and Noddy's failing relationship, some on the inability of the rhythm section to tune according to the increasingly computer-senile diktats of Michaela's pedal. Almost all accounts include one incident that included a dog, Roddy's mother and the police being called and then sent away. The resulting "Zoom oh very Zoom, we are going to see the king" although an undisputed classic of the genre, could not save the group. They broke up 3 weeks before the Queen invited them to play at the Royal Variety Performance.

The rest of the band started careers unconnected with junior-electronics but quickly found themselves asked to perform tongue-in-cheeck versions of the Hey Hey It's Saturday theme for weddings, school discos and bar mitzvahs. Over time, people even forgot exactly why these guys did the cover version and were just known as the "Hey, Hey, guys."

Michaela took to buying large quantities of 505s and connecting them in ever-more intricate ways. Although she never planned to release this music she was convinced to do so by Billy, whom she decided to rekindle and kindle she did. The early experimentation she completed led to pitch bending and circuit breaking now being seen as slightly odd ways for a youngster to spend their Saturday afternoons.

#10 Saint Van Saint

2009-03-25T22:23:00.000Z

French electro-disciple duo Saint Van Saint, better known for their 1998 dabble into the annals of Eurovision history, are actually one of the Massif Central's greatest exports.

They burst onto the electro-pop scene in 1995 with all the colour, light and energy of a 300 candlepower torch, like a French God-fearing Kraftwerk. Thaddeus James and Bartholomew John were soon entertaining the population of the greater Haute-Loire region with their keytars, minimoogs and "beats so meaty you'll partake in graffiti". The actual translation isn't great but the sentiment is there.

Refusing to conform to all expected stereotypes, the two shunned a quiet childhood growing up in their respective parents vineyards, crushing grapes with their bare feet and making cheese on the side. They just needed the hand of fate to visit them in the way only hands of fate can. It came knocking. In the summer of 1982 James suffered an horrific accident, and it was this which would ultimately lead to the veritable paradigm shift in the course of French music history. In what seemed like a harmless jape Batholomew challenged Thaddeus to inhale thirty-one helium balloons in five minutes. Only seven balloons in and James' voice was altered permanently. When his voice finally broke at the age of twenty it took on the now infamous robotic timbre. It was with this haunting man-machine tonebox that some of the greatest French electro-house would be sung.

Saint Van Saint donned instruments and became an overnight success, appearing on such national TV favourites as 'Vendredi Soir avec Gérard Depardieu' and 'Le Top, Le Pops'. No more would the French peoples have to endure the ridicule of a below par music scene. Sure, we had heard of 'Michel Michel et les Chanteurs Rouges de Poissons' but Celine Dion is actually Canadian and who was this Debussy lad they kept banging on about and putting on our mix tapes when we weren't looking? (as if we wouldn't notice).

The two had been brought up within creationist families who took particular offence to geologists, vulcanologists and the like. So it is no surprise that their strict creationist doctrine made for some interesting musical themes. 'Sur le Lapin' is a tasty anti-evolutionary rant verging on a musical take on Kipling's Just So Stories. The metallic vocals ring out over a synth/bass fusion so meat-based that, as promised, it would indeed make even the strongest willed at least scrawl something on a wall with a bic, and the meekest immediately purchase spray paint by the crate. The lyrics leave you equally without doubt where the heart of Saint Van Saint lies. Sur le Lapin itself is a great example - '...les oreilles du lapin sont un signe de puissance divine de dieux' or 'the ears of the rabbit are a sign of a divine god'.

1994 saw the release of their long-awaited first album 'Évoluez ce M. Darwin' or 'Evolve this Mr Darwin'. The first single released was the catchy 'Les Fossiles Ils Disent Le Non!' or 'The Fossils Say No!'. With reckless abandon and an innocence the like of which had never before been seen Thaddeus' spoken word epic exclaims '...like the rocks of the earth your face is unscathed and youthful'. Romantic, if nonsensical.

Performed live each song tended to descend into utter synth chaos and improvised rants. The favourite was 'Le Septième Jour il a Fait Votre Maman' or 'On the Seventh Day He Made Yo' Mama' in which Bartholomew would turn his Yamaha PSR 1110 on to 'demo' and improvise over the top using 'Orchestral Hit' (that one that sounds like a dog barking) for the melody. Not since Yes' 'Owner of a Lonely Heart' has that technique been used with such aplomb.

Despite the huge public following Saint Van Saint were not comfortable in the spotlight and quickly realised they would have to leave France to re-discover what it was that got them playing music in the first place. SVS chose to tour the lands that time forgot, Liechtenstein, Andora and Wales, before finally choosing to settle in Luxembourg. It was here in the unlikeliest of places and under the tutelage of Lux superstar Louis le Pasteur that they found music again. This time the music was breezy electro-pop, the politics were left to the infirm and the dress code was strictly smart casual.

Saint Van Saint had come of age.

In 1998 in what would have been an almost unthinkable move less than two years previously, the group entered the Eurovision Song Contest on behalf of Luxembourg. With their new sound firmly honed their choice of song was highly indicative of the massive strides they had made in such a short time. 'Na na na. Pop Pourquoi?' may seem on the face of it yet another ephemeral pop sing-along. For those who read deeper it was in fact a subtle dissection of the role of music in popular culture. Just listen to the lyrics - 'Pop pourquoi? Parce que, parce que'. It seemed that on the most unlikely of stages the duo had mellowed, found their niche and were finally at peace with themselves. The fact that Saint Van Saint went to score a final total of 'douze points', all awarded by the people of France, tells its own story.

In a triumphant return to French soil the pair were welcomed off the plane by then premier Jacques Chirac, who asked them to play a set at the home of Electro-House - Disneyland Paris. Following said gig the duo were immortalised forever by being conducted into the UNICEF sponsored 'It's a Small World' hall of fame. The pair's miniature doubles are to this day situated next to the clog stomping Dutch, just before the waffle munching miniature Belgians, and do their bit for world peace by singing out the shrill message for the children of the world.

They still perform to this day. You can catch them performing during the winter season in the 'Main Street' parade, daily on the half hour between 8:30 and 10pm.

#9- Minibarb

2009-03-25T17:16:00.000Z

The things that have happened in hotel rooms are too numerous and sickening to tell. The music fraternity should just accept that caravanning is the only way to stay away from home and should then just be left to clean up their own mess. At only one moment in the whole of human history would there be anything beneficial to come out of a hotel room and that was the humbling, lonesome genius of Minibarb. Born Charlston Hippomouth in 1971, as Minibarb he would take over a small corner of the music scene and have a small and comforting set of walls built around him.

The early nineties are not a time associated with acoustic-noise bands, but Minibarb took no notice of the things going on around him. This is not hyperbole: Minibarb did not listen to any records, did not like being out of the house and only listened to the nascent talk radio stations on the wireless. As an agoraphobic alcoholic, Charlston took the guitar he had inherited upon his Aunty's death and crafted soundscapes that even the vaunted Silicon Graphics Computers could not reproduce at the time.

Fisher Price tape recorder on his knee, Hippomouth recorded a demo tape using his bath, airing cupboard and wherever else he found himself to create a close, echo-imbued sound. His increasingly complicated pre-microphone arrangements meant that any movement from his guitar sounded like a 1024 colour vista etched in feedback. His DTs provided more than enough background material even before he started plucking and the demo tape was quickly snapped up by Spinstaar Records. Released without an artist's name, the album, called Minibarb Blues shot to number 998.3 of the new world order, acoustic-noise and Jazz chart.

Many confused buyers -and the Our Price store in Ryde, IOW- thought that the album was called Blues by the artist Minibarb. Reluctant to upset absolutely anyone, Charlton took on the name. His next challenge was to play infront of live audiences. His first tour was set to take places in either very small pubs or pubs with tiny-enough booths. Successful gigs at the Blue Bell in York and in the central booth at The Princess Louise in Holborn could not stop the panic attacks that accompanied every attempt to get him out of the venue and away from the bar. Eventually Minibarb would refuse to leave his hotel room.

Faced with an artist called Minibarb who will not come out of Room 217, Spinstaar came up with a novel solution. The fans would come to him, would partake of the Minibar drinks (at a cost the hotel loved to charge them) and would get the gig for free. Touts unofficially connected to the record company would sell branded merchandise as the imbibed guests were leaving.

This business model suited everyone. The hotel had people actually use the minibar, (even to buy peanuts), the record company made money from the touts and the other guests at the hotel had already paid for their rooms. So they couldn't complain. Fantastic!

As it turned out, the en-suite toilet of a chain hotel was the perfect place for Minibarb to ply his pedal-heavy acoustic nonsense. The toilet room acted as a hall reverb pitched to one side of the venue and the bed was conveniently close by. Minibarb was in a form of heaven that only severe amounts of therapy could beat. But when he started attending said therapy, Spinstaar started to worry that they were going to lose their only profitable signing. (For the record, Justin Jus and the Saucier Sisters had a novelty hit with "Been Mashing Mash Potato Au Gratin Au Naturalle Pour Homme Pour Femme De Vin De Pain" in 1984, but due to reckless spending on other haute cusine-related singles Spinstaar was as good as broke when then received the demo from the artist who would come to be known as Minibarb.) Spinstaar, unwilling to free their man from his daemons, fed Minibarb a spiked drink and moved the lifeless body into a new hotel room with walls that did actually move in closer every day.

Minibarb, shocked at first by the dimensions of the wall actually changing went on record two more albums, "The Walls are Alive" and "If These Walls Could Talk (they'd say "We're Alive!")". Through his success and his ability to rationalise his thoughts into experience, as shown by his walls, Minibarb grew in confidence and understanding. His fragile mental state actually boosted by the record company's Machiavellian undertaking, Minibarb was able to go outside in 1994. He walked to Woolworth's and bought a dark chocolate Bounty.

Now that the smoking ban is in place, Minibarb goes out whenever he wants a tab.

#8 Baking Soda Pops

2009-03-23T22:01:00.001Z

No one knows quite why the weasel went 'Pop!'. What we do know is that when early-nineties indie twee-sters Baking Soda Pops came onto the scene they did so with the combustible volatility of at least three of said long-tailed mammal.

The group formed in 1991 following the untimely demise of two of Blackpool's most promising pop groups - 'Coin-Op Tot' and 'The Jürgen Kilnsmann Project'. As if a small child powered purely by the insertion of assorted coins wasn't bad enough, yes there was also a band that paid homage to the 'swan-diving ' German. The latter was the conception of one Jodie Ace, a child prodigy and son of Blackpool oil tycoon and magnet magnate Donald Ace II. Through his membership of Blackpool's only historical re-enactors of that good bit in hit movie 'ET the Extra-Terrestrial' where they fly on bikes, the young Ace became good friends with Sophie Abernathy then of New Wave funksters Coin-Op Tot.

The two wound up their respective projects, joined forces and were soon taken up by Baby Elephant Records. The label was initially keen to promote the unique selling points of the band and endorsed the 'Pops as their flagship group. Under the careful management of label boss Terry Thomason the group quickly became THE twee indie pop band of any generation that regularly reference obscure mid-nineties footballers. This, coupled with their use of incredibly long song titles, carved them a niche fit for disconsolate pubescent teenagers the county over. 1991's 'We Sang on that Winter's Night and all because you said you loved me Matthew Le Tissier' and 'Oh, I thought you liked me, but then I found out you could do without me Tony Yeboah (Is It True?)' were just two of the 'Pops offerings that found small scale favour with the hebetudinous of the community.

Nineties scenesters united behind the 'Pops, and were quick to copy their look of white suits and black string ties, as originally made famous by one Colonel Harland Sanders. But, in the eyes of the critics, and unlike the southern fried chicken with which the Colonel found fame, the Pops musical outings were rarely finger licking good. Indeed, their only real success came with 1993's 'John Salako Stole Your Love From Me'. Daily local news journal the Blackpool Star gave the single 3 and a half donkeys out of five, exclaiming it to be the greatest song ever written about a Crystal Palace player in love. Bizarrely, the group were also contacted by 'Tweed Monthly' magazine, who although having clearly been misinformed as to what they were actually reviewing, decided to run with the article nonetheless. A small write-up followed which sat surprisingly well next to an article on twill. The piece also led to a notable surge in popularity amongst the hunting, shooting fishing fraternity.

Despite support slots with a number of local groups the band also failed to captivate live audiences. The ostentation of the music was matched with equally pretentious live performances. Ace would prance onto the stage proclaiming himself the Prince of all Pies and would ask members of the audience to come with him on a journey through the crust to the meaty interior, as he played his electric kaleidoscope and sang about how Newcastle favourite Ruel Fox was a dainty flower child for the thirty-seventh time.

In late 1993, as with all groups who base their popularity around twee-pop, mid-nineties footballers and electric kaleidoscopes the 'good times' came to an end. When it soon became clear that Ace was yet another child prodigy 'gone bad' and string ties were replaced with ruffs, Baby Elephant Records turned their back on the 'Pops. The group themselves released a statement which denied they had been dropped but simply that they had parted ways to concentrate on their historical re-enactments. Ace was last heard to be planning an ambitious re-enactment of that scene in Postman Pat when they finally realise it was Mrs Goggins all along.

#7- Spectrum Middle Age Non-Violent Direct Action

2009-03-23T19:10:00.000Z

Who do you think you are kidding Mr Cobain? Youth was never all it cracked up to be and most bands whine incessantly about the lies told to them by advertisers whilst simultaneously peddling the same lies to an even younger audience. Spectrum Middle Age Non-Violent Direct Action sought to tell you a new story. A story about how being older was also not going to be as good as the television says, either.

SMANVDA was borne from the dialectic between fathers and sons in late capitalism. Allec Callender, Ben Parkinson, Lionel Hardcastle and Clive Quigley all had sons who attended St Humperdinck's grant maintained sixth form college in Boston, Lancs. Their boys, whilst a good sort at heart, did not appear overly interested in rugby; neither the league or congressional version of the game could wet their whistle. Oh how their father's lamented. The boys did seem eager to pursue a career in professional musicmaking and their father's were happy to buy them whatever they desired to keep them from mentioning their indiscretions to their mothers. Both the mothers of the sons and the mothers of the fathers.

The band the young fellows created was -to their father's eyes at least- dangerously subversive. They advocated all sorts of filthy, seedy things; including liberation theology and non-literal metousiosis. To their staunch protestant fathers even this left-wing and wimpy version of Catholicism was enough to boil their blood. The fathers were so happy when the boys ended up in different Oxford Colleges. The buoys became unable to see each other without a minder from their own college to check they were not passing on official secrets to each other. And so were not able to practice without 4 3rd year snots their to oversee their meetings. As it happened, they were the only 4 people to turn up to their gigs.

The boys quickly gave up the music and took to learning more about the inside of SIS and Toilette and Douche from the ever-so-interesting shoulder tappers who would come by every rainy Wednesday afternoon.

Their father's, now bequeathed instruments their sons no longer required. These instruments were, in their eyes, smothered with the sin of believing in something approaching Christian Socialism, so they had little other option than starting their own band. Parkinson took on viola, Quigley beat the traps, Hardcastle sang in a rich baritone and Callendar made the tea (Herefordshire tea if they were feeling rich, Woolworth's own brand if they felt asset rich but cash poor) and provided management services such as accountancy and happy endings.

To say their first record smelled would be like saying there are many types of cheese. It would be correct but it wouldn't really explain very much at all. The album was filled with good clean fun and ruminations on the leader section of the Telegraph. One of the tracks. "I see Sergeant Major Billy Rickingtons has died" was recorded more as a prank by their sound engineer than anything else. It still went on to sell 6 million copies. But why? The short answer is that it was backed with a cleaned up cover of a Zeilinople track, which they had called "Duck Everything."

The crowds went wild. The gimmick in place, the men took to pretending it was what they wanted all along. Quigley argued that "Too many good songs have got bad words in," and they searched to make a whole album as quickly as possible. So quickly indeed, that some people suspect that the band were happily listening to music with bad words in all along. Quigley explained the song writing process as "Changing all the F words to Duck, all the C words to Shunt and for all the S words we simply said hit." The album "Ducking the Suburbs" sold out all over the world, the young and trendy listeners using the words duck, shunt and hit to say what they would have already said. Though the album is not a classic, SMANVDA had learned a valuable lesson about semantics.

#6 Bunch of Clives

2009-03-22T14:55:00.000Z

Three tone Ska favourites Bunch of Clives formed in April 1972 in the southern English metropolis and home of the UK Hydrographic Office, Taunton.

Cider drenched Somerset may seem an unlikely venue for such an insidious and heady mix of young male instrumentalists and the popular music of the day. And why the extra tone I hear you cry? (As we all did when we heard the laidback stylings of 'Knees Up for Camden' for the first time). For the seven young affiliates of Bunch of Clives two tone was "all a bit black and white". Whereas two tone was built around ska, punk and reggae The Clives subtly blended all the above with the apocalyptic sounds of 'viking metal' (popularised at the time by Scandinavian doom merchants Abbott Rabbit). And, surprisingly given their traditional West Country upbringing, the Clives' only had three songs about apples, one about cheese and only two named actual makes of combine harvester.

The band themselves comprised Timothy "Clive" Branson (tambourine), Neville "Clive" Hebblethwaite (vocals), Randy "Clive" McRand (snare drum) , Boris Clive"Horace (sousaphone), Steve M "Clive" Chambers (tromboneaphone), The Professor (kazoo/accordion) and Terry "Nigel" Grantham (guitar). Their unusual grouping of instruments was testament to their desire to infuse a little Somerset culture to their music, whilst not being the Wurzles. Bunch of Clives succeeded where so many before had failed - The Winzles, Hay Bail Bob, Wimble Hill and The Wazzles to name four. Where many failed theirs soon became the key sound and ethos of the three tone sound.

The septet's first and only performance took place whilst travelling on the 25a bus home from Cotsford St Luke. The group had partaken in a little light solo busking, had picked up their dole money and, after an impromptu visit to the local Woolworths, headed home.

Little is known about the hirsute hebdomad. One thing we do know is that the sultry seven never released a song. By the time they disbanded in early May 1972 three of the band had never actually got to play an instrument. Rumor has it the bus journey was shorter than they had remembered and they were yet to reach a part where two of the band came in. Timothy had earlier missed his cue - only later did he give his tambourine a little shake. By that stage the gig was over, the band had split up and the rest of the members were sitting at home watching hit tv show 'It's a Knockout' and were tucking into Postman Pat spaghetti shapes on toast.
Perhaps the group's longest lasting legacy is the Clives' patented dance (patent pending). Within a week of their vehicular recital, youths all the way from Creech St Michael to Cheddon Fitzplaine were copying the impromptu jiggling of Clives' sousaphone player Boris Horace. The story goes that whilst helping a hapless pensioner onto the bus Boris stumbled, fell a little and collapsed onto said OAP with fatal consequences. Despite the subsequent legal action his flailing leg and arm combination was hypnotic, and due to the lizard like movements which participants use, the term 'Skinking' was coined.

The Clives' sound became well-beloved by many far-right skinheads who happened to be on the same bus. Neville in particular found this hard to deal with, as he was later quoted as saying "men without hair are like man-babies" and that it "just wasn't right". Neville's follicle prejudice had already gotten him into trouble on five previous occasions. One particular incident saw him charged with assaults on no less than seven threadbare celebrities in one night, including Sinead O'Connor, The Dalai Lama and all three of 'Blue Man Group'.

The group still hold the record for the shortest three tone song of all time. At 1.5 seconds 'Your Hurtful Words are Like a (Bullet in my Head Bone)' is a soaring piece of muscianship that in many ways defined the three tone sound. The group were soon visited by star of genre bending hit TV show Record Breakers, Roy Castle. Castle awarded the group with their certificate, branded paperweight and a signed photo of Noris McWhirter. McWhirter, who couldn't make the presentation, was overseeing a record for 'most Capuchin monkeys wearing trousers at one time'.

The attempt failed and the record stands at six.

#5- Dismissive Missive

2009-03-21T13:47:00.000Z

It's not so long since the court of public opinion held that skinny guys with guitars were pathetic loners and people who could mix two different songs together were the envy of folks all over the world. We all know that Twickenham scenesters Afro-bet changed all that, but at one time even a fool with a whistle and a working finger that could increase and decrease some repetitive bass-heavy drone could gain near universal respect and admiration. The court of public opinion is -as political activist Martin B Hooker would no doubt say- in contempt of itself.

Dismissive Missive (b. Henry Plantaganet, 1421) was a street-smart London urbanite who owned some decks and a mixer. Due to an accidental ebay purchase he also found himself in possession of a spring reverb. Not knowing what it was, he instinctively hooked it up to his decks -somehow overcoming any impedance issues- and managed to drench Slinky Disco's 1991 classic 'Nightclub Communion Wafer' in reverberating goodness. It almost made the song listenable. Missive knew he had something going on.

The big shock came when he went to get some more crisps from the kitchen. Knocking the housing of his new toy produced a quickening and deepening of the reverb. He reached for some drumsticks, ate the sweet, succulent chicken and then used the bones to 'play' the reverb.

Of course, if he wanted to play this live he would need some bigger bones; perhaps those of a dog, a bricklayer or a koala. After being removed from London Zoo and summarily banned from there, The Planetarium and Mademoiselle Tussauds- he went to find his treasure at the Broken Duck Pub in Seven Kings, IG3. (This was opposite the same Woolworths where Roxy McTaggart met Enoch M Farraday and plotted the start of Melvin and Maureen's Musical Kissograms.) A wise old man in the pub sold him a fibular from a goat that had died of natural causes: as long as being killed for meat is still classed as natural. He also sold him 300 Benson and Hedgehogs and a litre of Hogarth's Gin for £25.

At his first gig Missive played his bones on the Spring Reverb, mixing ''aint got no feelin'' to 'Swollen Brain Gland'. The crowd appeared to appreciate the new set of sounds available to them and Missive was rewarded with a regular slot at The Ministry of Culture, Media and Sport. Playing the afternoon warm up to a regular crowd of 19 burn-outs and dealers, Missive gained a cult club following, even being asked to mix the Ministry's 'DeFAMEations' box set.

His name appeared on neon-coloured paper hoardings outside the clubs where he would play one-offs; his ITV chart show was sponsored by Roller Cola; The Queen was presented with a box-set of his mixes by mistake by the Turkish delegation to the G20 summit. Missive had it all.

And you know what? He kept it. He didn't spend it on drugs or women or men or cars or houses or food or nuffin. He just kept it safe in the Royal Bank of Pembrokeshire. In May 2009 RBP filed for administration relief following an over-investment in Icelandic Icicles. Missive was thrown into debtors jail with his son, Edward of Westminster. They expect to be released on bail as soon as Missive's good friend and distant relative Richie Gloss finds the money.

#4 The Sneaky Bitches

2009-03-20T08:21:00.000Z

Settle, North Yorkshire - mid-eighties hot-bed of UK grunge. Bands such as The Tone-Deaf Moses and Baby Giro were prevalent on the Yorkshire grunge scene which affectionately became known as 'Reet Dirty Musak'.

Enter The Sneaky Bitches.

Formed at a time when Nirvana was still just a form of universal transcendence, Mudhoney was probably the least popular of all sandwich fillings and Soundgarden was what happened when you took your stereo out the back of your house. The Sneaky Bitches were ahead of their time by several months.

The band comprised Bruce 'the Jimmy' Greeves (Vocals), Mookie Blaylock (Bass), Jodie McTaggart (Drums), Neil 'What you talkin' about' Willis (Lead Guitar) and Scottish Jim (Rhythm Guitar 1980-1982). The 'Bitches spent the early Eighties entertaining the gentle Yorkshire folk as a Wham! covers band, whilst funding their pursuits with part-time jobs in the local Woolworths, where the five originally met. It was due to one ill-fated night that the bands sound and fortunes changed.

This particular night the manager was late for a seminar in local Skipton, hosted by Thora Hird (DBE) about the role of the flat cap in BBC TV's hit comedy 'The Last of the Summer Wine'. The five were left in the store by themselves and charged with the task of locking up. Eighties excess took hold as the five gorged themselves on pick and mix, snorting coke bottles and smoking foam bananas. Needless to say it wasn't long before the band found themselves unemployed, homeless and having to pawn their instruments to fund their all consuming habit. On 4 June 1984 Scottish Jim was sacked by the other members of the band. They found him in bed with Neil's then girlfriend Tracey Von Deiter (then of 80s synthers Gentle Mental) and 6,000 assorted gummi bears.

Scottish Jim shunned the name given to him by his band mates and with a little help from his cousin's uncle, Marti Pellow, went on to form Wet Wet Wet.

The Sneaky Bitches vowed to continue without their rhythm guitarist. Their sound changed overnight. They pawned their keytars, persephones and trautoniums and started afresh. Left with nothing between them except for 23 pence, a C&A voucher (expired 1 May 1982) and the flannel shirts on their backs, they were forced to start over again. The group took to roaming the streets robbing small children of their Tesco vouchers for schools. It wasn't long before they had saved up enough for the instruments they needed. The quality of the instruments defined their sound and thus grunge was born on the steppes of North Yorkshire.

Their sound, whilst dirty, was inspired by the choral works of The Malham Moor Primary School Vocal Jazz Choir. This would often lead to their use of drop B tuning and the 5/9 time signature. The group made their name by touring local church halls, rocking the congregation with their self styled noise solos and rollicking percussive interludes.

On the back of their 'Jesus Loves You Dirty' tour they self-released an EP in 1986 titled 'Smells Like Mass Murder'. The 3 track masterpiece is an epic re-imagining of the life and times of Pol Pot as a Yorkshire lad. The title track 'Pot, Settle, Genocide' was a touching piece that charted Pot's early life growing up in the Yorkshire town as a bread delivery boy.

Their only video was a musical first. At first the video appears to be yet another nineties grunge outing charting The Rapture and ensuing carnage. The twist came when the band decided to strap cameras to pygmy goats and in turn pygmy goats to the back of pigs to capture the action. The result is a visual tour de force that reflects not only the chaos of their lifestyle and music, but is also a subtle comment on the human condition. It remains a Youtube mainstay to this day and is consistently rated 2-3 stars.

It was the summer of 1989 and just as The Bitches appeared to be on the cusp of total, local domination, disaster struck. Lead guitarist and songwriter Neil Willis had to deal with one personal tragedy after another. In June he lost his foot in a bizarre boating incident. July saw his girlfriend leave him for Eighties heart throb (and star of hit TV show Gladiators) Gladiator and racial stereotype, Shadow. Psychologically he would never recover. By August he refused to leave the house and quickly became obsessed by hit TV show Diff'rent Strokes, and in particular child-man Gary Coleman. In a bizarre case of art reflecting life Neil tried to put himself up for adoption, demanding that he and his white midget brother be taken in by an upper class black family who would care for him and protect him from the mildly racist attitude of their friends and neighbours. Sadly for Neil there was no midget brother, there was no family and Diff'rent Strokes hadn't aired since 7 March 1986. Neil was sectioned on 15 April 1989.

The band would never recover. Jimmy quit, Jodie got married and many critics said they should have known they would never get that far. The band's last act was to scrawl the words 'Grunge is Dead' across the window of the local BHS. A year later Nirvana released Nevermind and the rest is history...

Footnote
At the end of 2008 talk amongst the population of Settle and the Willis family in particular, perpetuated that, on the back of a number of other bands making successful comebacks The Bitches planned to do the same. The new album, working title 'Bush is Dead', is thought to be an epic 3 hour recording which charts the rise and fall of the grunge scene, ending with the demise of their idols of the same name.

The initial release is thought to be around 20 to 30 copies and will be released for free on Lime Wire and will be available on cassette tape and mini disc in charity shops in and around Giggleswick.

#3- Eanus Horribilis

2009-03-19T19:26:00.000Z

Eanus Horribilis (b. Eanus Henry Chalfont, 1954) was a one-man punk outfit known for the leftward turn taken in his music in 1977. His case shows the inaccuracies of the current model we have for reporting on gigs and to a wider extent blows the myth that one man cannot step out of his time and make a short-lived, pointless difference to practically no lives at all.

Horribilis started making music in his native The Wirral in the mid seventies. Like many young public-school educated toffs, he was looking to make a difference through the raw power of basic chords and impressively poor lyrics. He wrote songs like "Ear Nose and Throat - tertainment" and "The Power of Pussywillow": instantly forgettable, pathetically dire, sub-par pub rock. His first album Duet Mon Droit, sold poorly and was listened to infrequently. This was a time before really sucking became cool. Punk was still an aspirational artform that saluted successful failures. Horribilus was a failure in any argot.

Then came his moment. He would -by a turn of evens later described as "complete chuffing mix-up"- catch the most inspirational gig of his life, in Manchester, June 1976.

His good friend and sometime labelmate Savage Sam (unaware of the Disney copyright at the time) spoke to him in quietened tones about the upcoming gig at the Free Trade Hall. Horribilus had as a child suffered from otitis media and this required grommets to be installed on both ears. He was left a little hard of hearing on his telephone-answering and cigarette-disappearing side. Not really hearing conversations became an artform for Horribilus and in a peninsula with only one good gig venue you can't go much wrong. Manchester however, has more than one place to catch an up and coming pop quartet...

The Sax Pastels played 3 gigs in their short, heavily moonshine-altered existence as a band. Only one person ever turned up to one of their gigs, but the resonance of that speaks to this day. Their tango-woven jazz-pop melodies fused the commercial prog of Dwarfclimber with the Latin-beat of the Funky Chicken. Horribilus, there by mistake and mesmerised with the textural rhythms and large cigars, was hooked. He was the only person to hear their music and he already had a band.

Running the 53 miles back to his mams after the gig, Horribilus had realised the errors of his ways. Others may see punk as a convenient shorthand for "I want to get punking laid", but Horribilus would no more. He set about melding the early world music he had just encountered with a 3 chord, shifting time signature melody-ladened dirge. His songs sometimes required 30 strong lads to play the glockenspiel whilst Horribilus pogo'd and shifted between Em5 and Am5. This was modern guitar music.

His first album since this revitalisation "[insert Latin gag here]" earned him no new fans, but respect and flowers poured in form around the globe. His friends started calling him again and although he couldn't really hear what they were saying, he was glad to think that the phone was ringing.

A classic Eanus Horribilus track would start with our hero playing out-takes and soundbites from the track before, mixing them together to form a beat, whereupon the 160-piece orchestra he had hired would sway into the melody. Horribilus would join with his guitar, picking out the barre chords that best went with what the orchestra were playing. Eventually, some Hula singers would take the melody off him and pass it around themselves, following the 'two drags and pass it on' rule. It was mind bending stuff.

Eventually, Eanus could no longer afford to pay the orchestra on his modest salary as a middle manager at Woolworth's in Greasby. Plus his mam got sick of cooking for a full woodwind section who then just pushed the food around the plate. His orchestra petered away and he was left with just him a flautist called Barmy Jane. Seeing the look in her eyes as she lightly positioned a finger over her embouchure hole, Horribilus realised he had gained something more than a friend who can hit C7. Music seemed to matter less and less to him.

Jane and Eanus were married on 5 March 1982. Their love produced three healthy children, none of whom suffered from any kind of middle-ear infection at all. Eanus passed away peacefully in his sleep in April 2005, following a long battle with dutch elm disease. He was regional sales manager.

#2 Patch Chudkins

2009-03-18T17:33:00.000Z

Patch Chudkins. Believe it or not a force to be reckoned with in the mid-Eighties far-right folk scene.

The Early Days
This band of misfit troubadours grew up in cosmopolitan Whitehaven, itself famed for the 1778 attack on it's harbour by Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones. It was against a backdrop of apparent civil unrest and fear of the way of life changing in 'The 'haven' that the group were formed.

Born to a family of travelling minstrels brother and sister, Guthrie and Ruth Arichibold at last found a home when their parents settled down in the 'haven. Rumour has it that Ruth was actually the secret love child of Anthony Eden and that the family moved to the town and settled down on the back of a sizeable pay-off from the Eden estate. Although, this is now thought to be largely unfounded.

Between the ages of 6 and 12 the pair would entertain family, friends and well-wishers at Christmas. Regaling them with musical tales of life in the 'haven. By the age of 12 they were performing outside J Sainsbury on a Saturday morning under the name 'The Children of the Seig Heil Sputnick'. Guthrie's distinctive and haunting falsetto wail would accompany Ruth's unusual one handed bellow technique on the accordion.

Ezekial - Saviour, Strummer, Facist
It wasn't until their fortuitous meeting with Ezekial M Haberdasher in 1972 that the duo became a trio. He was a local musician looking for an edge to his guitar-based funkery and 'The Children of the Seig Heil Sputnick' provided that outlet. He quickly pushed for a name change that reflected their pastoral musicianship, one which would let their politics do the talking and would lend itself to an extensive range of toys . Thus Patch Chudkins was born.

Influences
The group were influenced by far-right politicians such as Italo Balbo, Fumimaro Konoe and amazingly later on the writings of popular Eighties heart-throb, Tom Selleck. (Interestingly Selleck would later become an honorary, and sole member of the Patch Chudkins mailing list).

With the song writing power house of Haberdasher behind them, the Chudkins soon shot to local fame with hit after relentless hit from 1989's 'Get the Folk Out of Here' and 1990's 'Neil Kinnock Wants to Eat Your Babies'. The former was an anti-immigrant rant purely based around the chords C, D and B#7. The latter was an experimental album which fused latino rhythms with funky house stylings.

The Wilderness Years
By 1978 the Chudkins were one of Whitehaven's greatest exports, second only to George Washington's Grandmother. But it wasn't long before the egos threatened to ruin the relatively strong band dynamic. By this stage Haberdasher was suffering from acute psychosis brought on by a heady mix of Pints of Mild laced with horse tranquiliser. As the band toured the small establishments of North-East England Haberdasher regularly demanded centre stage and larger and larger cuts of the profits. During one rather lurid night he demanded a rider of 6 bails of hay, 7 sheep, the Ark Covenant and David Bowie's moustache (below). The other Chudkins, and even some Chudders (Patch Chudkins fans) were calling for Habidasher to leave.

(David Bowie's Moustache)

Two days after making the above demands Haberdasher was dead.

Death of the Habidasher
Rumour of Haberdasher's death swept through Whitehaven like a lit mongrel dog with a broom tied to it's tail. His body was found on a bench in Carlisle high street. His head was found eleven days later in an empty horse box at the Burghley Horse Trials. Two of Guthrie's beard hairs were found on the body. Police raided his house at 6am on 31 March 1991 and after 6 weeks in custody Guthrie admitted all charges. Ruth vowed to fight tirelessly for her brother's release through the medium of music.

Opportunity soon knocked.

The Brit-Pop Revival
It wasn't until the emergence of Brit-Pop onto the UK scene in the early to mid nineties that Patch (aka Ruth Archibold) found it's feet again. It was suggested to her by her incarcerated brother that she re-work some classics of the day. She went into the studio on the first of March 1998 and didn't emerge for 2 months. Whereupon she had recorded 7 distinct albums, the majority of which were song-for-song covers of what were seen at the time as modern day classics. The first of these was 'Oswald Mosley Shoals' but this release was quickly followed by 'In It For The Genocide' and 'Different Class, Different Race'. Bizarely Chudkins had found their most commercial success as a solo act, the albums selling in Woolworths stores from Barrow-in-Furness to Brampton.

Chudkins Today
At the time of writing (19 March 2009) Guthrie remains behind bars and Ruth is rumoured to be releasing the Chudkin's 120th studio album later this year, to coincide with the 10th year of her brother's imprisonment and the 40th anniversary of the first back in 1969. A live DVD 'Chudkins - Folking Live' is expected in the Autumn.

#1- Brecon Witch

2009-03-18T16:46:00.000Z

Like the mould on the plate in your brother's bedroom; there are some things that psychologically affect you which you can't do much about. Furthermore, history is a series of events tied together by politicians in increasingly small hats. Given both of these timeless truths it should be no surprise that more people have not heard of Brecon Witch. They stood on the parapet of infamy and were swept off by events: the rise of a new, nasty form of urban music. For shame.

Brecon Witch consisted of drumming vocalist Michael "Miguesy" Malone, his brother Jules "Jason" Malone and their old school friend and guitarist Teddy Edwards. They started jamming together as a way to try and escape their humdrum Droitwich existence of concrete, squalor and nearby fields.

The music represented he soaring beauty of the new Wilkinson's on the high street and the folk tales of the Welsh borders. With a lacklustre scream, Miguesy would lead the group into an acoustic breakdown, singing songs from the perspective of a local boy with a girl in the hills. This was actually based on his real life, when he dated Julie Beatrix -who would later have a hit under the pseudonym Spanners McCall-, a Welsh shepherd's daughter with a penchant for mixing IRC and barbiturates. Miguesy tried to embody their broken relationship into words using his limited vocabulary and repetitive, sub-industrial drumming. Teddy would try to follow along but would often find himself noodling to himself and chatting up the ladies on the front row. In his head. Jason was in charge of monitoring the batteries on the stomp boxes.

Their first and only eponymous album sold 7 copies and was a critical and commercial failure. However, somewhere in the music, somewhere deep inside the music, was a recollection of earlier failures and joys. "Limited Train Service" charts the pain of having to change at both Bromsgrove and Cardiff just to get to Merthyr Tydfil. "Front Seat, Back Sweat" looks at the 2 hour round journey Julie's dad had to make to pick him up. "Vee Hick Elle" states how much easier it would be if he had a car. Infact, now we listen to it again, the whole album about the complicated way you have to travel from England to Wales if you don't have a driving license.

In any event, their history was short as the wave of Detroitwich bands took over the scene. This low, pointless art form generally centred on having a Woolworth's bought imitation handgun stuffed into your pants and using their lyrics to sign increasingly resolute blood oaths to the Baldwin family of Bewdley.

Migeusy eventually got a new girlfriend closer to Droitwich and passed his test. Teddy's dad died just in time and he became 3rd Earl Cirencester. Jason is still pressing the ends of 9v batteries to watch the yellow streak grow. The mark Brecon Witch left on popular music was minuscule, but try to remember them the next time you're on the travelator at Manchester Piccadilly. I know I will.

Come Back Soon

2009-03-18T08:22:00.000Z

This site will be filled with bands you've never heard of; most with very good reason. Bands like Age of Declarious, Davy Davy and the Potato Croquettes, and Cosmo's Naught's. We'll be reviewing all this semenal work as quickly as is humanly possible. Which is not very quickly as all.

Come back soon, monster truckers!