Birkenhead's greatest ever band are back, every 3 or 4 years they raise their heads above the parapet and fire off verbal volleys of amusing vitriol. I'm talking about Half Man Half Biscuit of course, those four lads who shook the Wirral and who should be bigger than The Beatles. Their new album is snappily titled No-one cares about your creative hub so get your fuckin' hedge cut and it's out now on Probe Plus.
Forming in the early 80's and wowing a generation with the Back In The D.H.S.S. album (as well as classic songs such as Trumpton Riots, Dickie Davies Eyes, All I Want For Christmas Is A Dukla Prague Away Kit etc), the John Peel favourites have released consistently great music to the delight of a relatively small but extremely loyal fanbase ever since. Their unique brand of English humour even finds favour with fans around the world despite it being doubtful many of them have previously heard of much of what is referenced in the lyrics (Gubba Lookalikes, weighing in at Newton Abbot, Kendo Nagasaki, cresta, Gouranga, Gordon Burns etc etc etc....).
If it ain't broke don't fix it so here we have another album that doesn't veer from their trademark sound. An album that is currently lighting up an otherwise dull UK album chart. Observational humour is married to indie rock guitars, everything is familiar and we're all happy about it. Themes touched upon unsurprisingly include football "oh let me gaze upon your curves, instead of Ipswich Town reserves", daytime tv "I'll just guess and hope I'm right, the first man into space was Captain Bligh", oddball characters "I don't think I've encountered a man so irate, you're a better man than I if you get past his gate" and the disdain towards jobsworth's "who the fuck are you, trying to govern everybody's bat walks."
It's a bit pointless writing about them to be honest, by now you'll already know if you love them or not just like you'll already know what to expect from the new album. They say familiarity breeds contempt. They're wrong. Here's hoping HMHB are still acerbically tickling our funny bones for many years to come.
This is Knobheads On Quiz Shows.....
No comments:
Post a Comment