Penthouse, Monkey Island, Oxford Point, 11 November 2000
The New Rock Revolution which the NME heralded at the start of the decade promised to re-inject sneering, swaggering, snotty rock'n'roll attitude into a directionless music scene. Of course, it did nothing of the sort. Beyond a few good debut albums, the scene opened up new possibilities for hair-care salesmen, mobile phone companies and teen drama scriptwriters, while closing down opportunities for rockers too sick, ugly or funny to market.
Penthouse (renamed Fifty Tons of Black Terror after legal action from wealthy pornographers) were far too nasty a proposition for selling leather goods to pre-teens. By which I mean they sounded like the Jesus Lizard dressed as the Bad Seeds playing Pussy Galore records in a dustbin. As did Monkey Island.
I miss these guys, and fellow travelers like Groop Dogdrill and Gallon Drunk. But I get a rare pleasure from reading the names of bands they moved on to (via Gin Palace's Penthouse page):
Jon Free is now playing in GIN PALACE, plus does occasional stints with Country Teasers and London Dirthole Company (ex-Headbutt).
Charlie Finke now fronts THE CESARIANS , featuring ex-members of Gretschen Hofner, The Auteurs, Monkey Island and even Christian Death!
Tim Cedar went on to found the uber-heavy PART CHIMP, and primal electro-droners DIE MUNCH MACHINE
Esme MacDonald has a new band called, laughably, 'THE HORN'. He sings and plays bass in this band. He tells me Lunasound ('home of the has-beens') are going to put out an album by them next year...
Graeme Flynn left the band in June '99. He is currently playing in an outfit along with Jim Jones from Thee Hypnotics. Previously called BLACK MOSES, I have it on good authority that they have changed their name to the (rather presumptuous) 'LICENSED TO DESTROY!!!':
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
i like DIE MUNCH MACHINE best
Post a Comment