half man half biscuit: classic or dud

Worth reading

http://www.bigissue.com/features/6652/half-man-half-biscuit-and-a-very-british-odyssey

that's brilliant stuff, wow

there's a guy in the comments is who is not so impressed

I remember when the crowd were just regular folk. Football lads and the like. I've no time for these characters dressing up and writing every little incident down. King of Hi Vis, you could of saved yourself seven years study and a pile of cash by aquring the reflective coat on your first day of work and to this clown geoff " Get back on the railway platforms where you really belong " If the Big Issue want another slant on what it was like watching the band in the days of Fuji caps coming back from germany 88 then root out Brian Sheddy. Great band with shite fans

I saw them live once, around 10 years ago, in Liverpool. I remember the audience as being almost entirely male, quite blokey, mostly mid 30s to late 40s and that I looked quite out of place as a floppy haired student.

just discovered 'fear my wraith'

new one

https://d1wtzzt4oxg683.cloudfront.net/images/covers/large/66/170066.jpg

• Alehouse Futsal
• Man of Constant Sorrow (With A Garage In Constant Use)
• Knobheads on Quiz Shows
• Bladderwrack Allowance
• Renfield’s Afoot
• Terminus
• The Announcement
• What Made Colombia Famous
• Harsh Times in Umberstone Covert
• Every Time a Bell Rings
• Emergency Locksmith
• Mod Diff V Diff Hard Severe
• Swerving the Checkatrade

hahahaha so he HAS addressed Tranmere's non-league purgatory

This has done wonders for my mood. A shame to see Ken left though, hope his health improves.

Was wondering 'have they mellowed?' - then got to Knobheads On Quiz Shows. They have not :D

hmm, it is the best track by miles though

bell + maybe terminus also good

is it just me or have the last 2 HMHB albums been a bit of disappointment? "CSI Ambleside" was great

yeah they've lost much of the magic. they're trying fewer risks and all the songs really do sound the same now, a kind of hard-rock whinge predominating

thought urge a bit disappointing but 90 bisodol is front to back their best

I didn't think Urge To Offal was that good either. 90 Bisodol was OK, CSI: Ambleside a classic of our times.

90 Bisodol is great, Urge was where they fell off. CSI obviously amazing

bono > csi > 90 bisodol is maybe the greatest three album run

Inspirational album title though. Too many hubs in my life

Every album from maybe Godcore, certainly Voyage -> Bisodol is an unparalleled run tbh

I cant remember any songs from Bisodol except for "Tommy Walsh's Eco house" and "Excavating Rita"

"Trouble Over Bridgewater" and "Cammell Laird Social Club" were career highpoints imo

Trouble Over Bridgwater is the high mark among high marks imo

You'll get nothing like The Ballad Of Climie Fisher or Gubba Look-a-Likes on the new album, is all I'll say

Maybe this is a concept album about becoming a crotchety old git?

an anti-cocaine song strikes me as a little gauche by their standards

no legit lols yet

some of the songs on the first half sound like fairly standard chuggy early 90s Amerindie

I'll prob grow to like it

it has grown on me slightly - certainly better than Offal

it IS a concept album about becoming a crotchety old git - but I think deliberately

i couldn't get with Offal at all, but although this is pretty underwhelming compared to the album you've all been entirely correctly listing here, i've been enjoying it. moderately. the chugging is hard to avoid. Harsh Times in Umberstone Covert is a favourite i think. quite touching.

Geraldine [continuing a good line in touching HMHB women's names)

...don't be so self-conscious.
what became of the carefree you?
the one that would whistle to
throbbing gristle through
harsh times in Umberstone covert,
scoffing at the notion of a shoulder to cry on,
the very thought of a rock to rely on.
astonishing therefore to look at you now,
bitter with the gall,
reaching for the mainland (?).
i will mend you,
and i will tend to you,
take it as read,
with a needle and thread,
when you are falling apart at the seams,
i will make at that stitch in time."

and i must admit dad laughs at

[i]sour-faced, she picked up the gherkins,
saw christ in Dorothy Perkins,
oh geraldine we were so laissez-faire,
every other day was a non-sequitur:
hadron collider,
who's there?
knock knock.

the initial riff for every time a bell rings is v attractive as well, and again, though it doesn't quite hit the mark - i mean stuff like 'artisan gossip' brings its own embarrassment (the gaucheness DJ Mencap was talking about) - it's hard to argue with 'get your hedge cut, get your fucking hedge cut, stop meeting friends and cut your hedge'.

i mean in these pied times, i'll take what i'm given. almost wondering about going back to Offal, so to speak.

lol i was reading Barthes while listening to this on the tube, and felt this was very Nigel Blackwell:

but, underneath this discourse whose argument and whose approach I just presented, it seems to me that today i hear, in fleeting moments, another music.

have come around to the first 10 tracks of this album tbh - it's less funny or varied than previous albums but it has an elegiac heft

should end with 'every time a bell rings' though - the last three tracks are entirely superfluous, rising to irritating

a better HMHB song than anything theyve released in the last few years imo (ok it doesnt sound like them really but the lyrics express a similar suburban disdain)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_tGKd3egWI

That is closer to The Pre-New's vibe tbh - you must hear their two albums if you haven't

ooh featuring ex-members of Earl Brutus

The Pre New is good. I never saw Earl Brutus but did catch the Pre New at a festival about 8 years ago

Just discovered 'National Shite Day', truly a work whose time has come.

//////////////shawty got poll poll poll poll poll poll poll (part I: 2008 TRAX)\\\\\\\

this actually happened :)

back when it was 25 points for a #1, etc etc

anyway, pour one out for Stringy Bob

Great stuff, probably only time HMHB has featured on an ILM poll. If Coldwar Steve isn't a fan I'd be amazed.

The Doors/Floyd advert is icing on the cake for me.

the Stringy Bob verse is probably my pick for best verse of lyrics since the turn of the millennium tbh, it is literature

embrace the margin

Btw I'm from the US but I lived in Liverpool for 7 years -- some of it good, some of it bad, but it was probably worth it to be able to understand HMHB lyrics about northwest UK television broadcasting.

Good interview

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-em8_hueZI

Kinda weird to turn on Sky News the other morning and hear Sky's business presenter, Ian King, bantering away with Kay Burley about his favourite band, Half Man Half Biscuit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIl_NDp-U0M

new album 'the voltarol years' feb 18th

Was recently thinking they're due

on a fairly drunk listen this seems like the best for a while.

omg it's out!!!!

me Tarzan, you June