There's A Worm In My Head And A Fish In The Bed

Nestled quietly South West from Birmingham off the infamous M5, sits Stourbridge. Unassuming and fairly shadowed by the great Midlands city, it presented to the British indie pop scene a misshapen motley crew of four young men in 1986 who called themselves The Wonder Stuff. It was the brain child of it’s front man Miles Hunt; a mop haired, opinionated student type whose tongue in cheek humour was to become very essence of this unique band.

After a minor collection of flopped singles, the band caused an unusual stir with their highly acclaimed debut album ‘Eight Legged Groove Machine’ in August 1988, which ignited attention within the masses of public school types eager to adapt their intellectual tendencies towards a surrealistic way of appreciating modern music, not unlike the generation of the late Sixties breathing a sigh of relief at the Monty Python boom. Hard nosed and a furious dip into the growing craze of indie music, they led the way of future bands, some of which, are still around today. The Wonder Stuff’s adaptation to jumpy, enthusiastic, good feeling music still echoes through many striving bands even now.

This presentation of silly, comical lyrics fused with a folky approach sounded, as in their 1989 album, ‘Hup,’ not unlike a cross between The Goon Show and The Waterboys. Edging away drastically from the depressing, wrist slashing effects of traditional folk music, the band sold their concept through these incredible catchy lyrics that made their presence felt in any drunken hour before last orders. I can recall, as an impressionable grungy teenager, religiously playing and replaying this album, scribbling down every word so that I could sing along with utter gusto with my even more impressionable college friends.

It was a wise idea to take on two added guests for a fuller impact namely organist, James Taylor (not THE Taylor) and banjo wizz kid, Martin Bell (not that one either!) who created the complete folk sound that was a strong drive throughout the album. Released in October 1989, it became one of those albums that completed the helter skelter tour of the Eighties decade in music. The adoring public, delighted in such an optimistic album that it reached number 5 in the album chart, thus dressing the ears with all the hope and anticipation that the final months of a closing decade could only bring.

With it’s strong, dark colours of black, gold and electric blue, the album cover by ’Daylight Robbery,’ was rather like being shouted at from point blank range. Short and perfectly named, it was the ideal title for a ‘sit up and take note’ kind of album. It’s 12 tracks entwine themselves not just around the listeners ears but takes a hard dig into the imagination. Colourful and intricate, it’s lyrics draw up scene’s in the listener’s mind. Pictures form through thrashy sounds and shouted vocals, making it still exciting to indulge in even after it’s release almost 17 years ago.

Opening with the intriguingly titled, ‘Thirty Years In The Bathroom,’ the track takes us through a Pink Floyd style introduction in ‘Wish You Were Here,’ with it’s frantic flick through the frequencies of radio stations before throwing us head first into a hard hitting indie theme laced with surrounding bass lines and harmonious lyrics. The voices gel like melting chocolate, something that fails to reflect in many indie bands. With it’s opening line, of ‘my lavatory has been my sanctuary,’ we have a pretty definite idea as to what the rest of the album has in store. It mixes unusual styles and instruments, rarely heard in indie music including bongos and banshee wails. Hardly an uplifting piece, it still has a pleasant style to it and will not fail to please the most hardened on indie fans.

Through ‘Radio Ass Kiss,’ we are prepared to be enlightened with the surpassing talent of this lively band. Taking the mood up a notch, we are opened now to sound distortions and tambourine based backings not unlike those we had been delighted by in the band, Pop Will Eat Itself, who, at the same time, gave us the diverse approach to listening to extraordinary sounds.

Like a dive into the extremisms of strangling folk music, ‘Golden Green,’ is subtle enough to even please your grandmother. I fondly remember my father asking me to turn the album down, then promptly telling me to turn it up when hearing the gentle rhythms of that tinkling banjo break in this track. With it’s unique lyrics, we danced around with pretend tambourine and fake fiddle whilst chanting ‘..she’s taken all my vitamins, used up my lighter fuel…’ It has a totally undated feel and will still defiantly urge foot tapping and finger clicking for years to come. The first of the only two single releases, for me, it captured a certain spirit of what was felt within the young generations of the day. For a free thinking student, it was a time of sitting around in a large group of the fields with a out of tune guitar and not a care in the world. Launched onto the single charts only a month after the album release, it failed to capture anyone else’s imagination, sadly. It managed only number 33.

The silliness of ‘Lets Be Other People,’ fills the veins of this album with the same amount of unimportance yet fits beautifully in this album that not fail to impress even on first hearing the album today. As with the dreamy ‘Piece Of Sky,’ reflects a mood of lying around in tall grass on a sunny Summer afternoon. ‘So take a jump and steal a piece of sky..’ speaks of a devil -may -care attitude that I can still remember fondly that was very much of the day. Perhaps that is where the album dates itself, but however it may feel to the listener, it captures a uniqueness not unlike rock and roll first touched upon in the early Fifties.

The manic ‘Can’t Shape Up’ if fast paced and gives hunt the stage for which he can project his ability to chant wildly into a violently moving microphone. Thundery and tinged with the smoothness of wistful backing ‘oo’s and arh’s’, the guitars are taken on a quick blast around the studio and the band members are expected to keep up with it. Like ‘Windmills Of Your Mind’ on speed, this racy track takes on a slightly psychotic feel and the band show us a side of this albums soul searching personality. Like an human being, the unsettlement of the lyrics shows a vulnerability which is found in all of us. It is the strength of the sound in this powerfully charged rock themed song that holds the whole thing together. This track was, as I gather, recorded for the album at The Mayflower in New York on the 9th of May 1989.

The next and last single release of the album is the sturdy ‘Don’t Let Me Down, Gently.’ Emotionally charged in it’s lyrics, it is on a par, in my mind, with The Beatles, ‘Help,’ in the sense that it portrays a vulnerable state. However, in this case we listen to the story of a love drawing to a close and how that can effect the way we deal with things on a begging scale. Still punched out in a rock themed, glittering manner, we fall short of actually hearing the words, rather more the want of shouting them out to any passing being, whether they have personally let us down or not! With the words, ‘..I don’t think of you, do you think of me, is that often or not at all, and if you have to let me down my friend, then kick me to the floor…’ we can be excused when we jump hysterically around the floor, far from being kicked but more elated at such a ‘feel good’ record. Drum filled and exhaustingly accurate, indie style, this hit should have done better than it did. Failing to hit the top ten, it trailed at number 19 for a couple of weeks, it had been a ‘smash’ of a record, but only to the few that could appreciate it’s alluring quality. If anything, Hunt’s sneering, critical lyrics should have been enough to quash the thirst of anyone under the age of twenty five at the time, yet, sadly, the genius of it’s repetitive, skipped drum beat went unnoticed to most.

It would appear on the outset that ‘Cartoon Boyfriend,’ that this track could have been pinched from folk obsessed rockers The Waterboys. Yet, this track set in a minor key shows a darker side to the humorous Wonder Stuff. It tells of a stereotypical existence set to a backdrop of a weeping fiddle and a slower beated theme. Still of the perfectionist quality, it still, even in it’s depressing subject has a catchy, foot tapping anthem. Perhaps it is this that makes us enjoy the shockwave filled ’Good Night Though’ even more. Subtly absorbed in a sea of random guitar riffs and short lived drum beats, it lacks any tuneful quality we have now got used to from this album. It does, however, display the talents of someone with a harmonica. Voice distortion, very much in the same theme as Transvision Vamp were known to use from time to time, it holds all the harmonious charm of depressive pop/punk band, Public Image Limited. Perhaps it all albums are allowed a ’bum’ track, then this is it for ’Hup.’

Separated to the extreme from the last track, ’Unfaithful’ stands alone in it’s very simple dreamy, Irish folk sounding theme. Roaming across the counties of Ireland is probably suited if one wants to imagine the perfect setting. Fiddles are romantic and the beats are as gentle as a summer breeze, and it is it’s refreshing appearance that is the ultimate idyllic interlude for this rock stretched album. So, it is not a surprise when we are presented with that familiar charm of Hunt’s sneering vocals and the sound of a indie band performing tightly together in ’Them, Big Oak Trees.’ Suddenly, lyrics are meaningless and music is silly, yet pleasing. Which ever mode this band ever performed, it was inoffensive and charming and this track is unmistakeably The Wonder Stuff at there jumpy, happy best.

For the final track of this epitomised album, ‘Room 410,’ climbs the same musical ladder as the beginning of the album. It would seem that we have been taken on a complete tour of the many faces of this band and here we are back where we started. What does seems apparent is somehow PWEI were a discerning influence or perhaps the other way around. PWEI took indie by the neck and made it danceable by using bass backing tracks and a mixture of samples pinched from just about everywhere and anywhere. Here, we find TWS doing just that. One could sit and try to pick out every sample used, yet even though it was PWEI’s old trick, it is still stamped across with the hallmark of The Wonder Stuff by the long drawn out angelic notes by the lead vocals and backing. Musically, it somehow has became, in my mind, an epitome of it’s very own. This track can be heard in a multitude of other singles released by the same number of bands since 1989 and with this in mind, it surely puts this album on the same classic pedestal as all the other great albums in British music history.

After the sudden death of Rob ‘The Bass Thing’ Jones in 1993, their bass man, the idealism of The Wonder Stuff appeared to fall into the darkness. Sometimes, in music history, a band loose direction after the passing of a band member, yet others, have found inspiration and light. After finding the drive to carry on and only two top five albums after, they performed their farewell gig at the Phoenix Festival in 1994.

Several flopped projects have since come and gone and only the statutory compilation releases her and there remain. Forever in their debt, we have learnt great lessons from this band; to enjoy music with an indie flavour, with jollity and humour.


Perhaps if got the world to enjoy life in the same way, the world would be a nice place to visit again….


Martin Gilks - drums - who sadly died in a motorcycle accident in 2006.
Malcolm Treece - vocals/guitar
Miles Hunt - vocals/guitar

And special guests;
Martin Bell - fiddle/banjo
James Taylor - Hammond organ

Written by The Wonder Stuff
Polydor 1989
4228411871




©mduffy 2006