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The history of the Deep Freeze Mice part one
why is this record such a load of crap? Its hard to say really. Probably because none of the members of the Deep Freeze Mice knew anything about how to make one. They didn't know how to sing or write songs or play any musical instruments either, so there wasn't much chance that they were going to make a record which wasn't a load of crap. Unfortunately they were all too ingnorant to realise this, so they made an L.P. anyway and this is how it came out. Its lucky they didn't want to be brain surgeons. Here are the background details anyway. Alan Jenkins (b.16/3/59), Sherree Lawrence (b.24/5/59) and Graham Summers (b.30/7/58) were all at school together in Wellingborough - stop me if this gets too boring - until 1977 when they left and went to college. Alan went to university in Nottingham where he played guitar with various people, including Sherree sometimes, who called themselves The Deep Freeze Mice. The name came from a song called "Back to life the deep freeze mice" written by a friend of Alan's. He got the title from a newspaper headline. Meanwhile, Graham went to university in Leeds where he formed a band called The Statics which included a bass player called Michael Bunnage (b.21/12/58).
 In about June 1979 The Deep Freeze Mice, who still hadn't played live (they didn't have the first clue how), or recorded in a studio, decided to make an L.P. and they roped in Graham to play drums on it. Unfortunately all the members of the band dropped out except for Alan and Sherree, so they did it with this line up; (Alan played bass - Michael came along to the recording session but he hadn't really joined the band yet and he just contributed backing vocals on "I met a man who spoke like an UCCA form"). They were also very short of money but Alan and Graham worked in factories for a few weeks that summer and saved up about ..450 which they used to pay for one day in an eight track studio in Nottingham and to press 250 copies of the L.P. They also saved money by using plain white covers with photocopies stuck on them, and also by only recording side one of the record in a studio. Side two of the L.P. was a collage of various cassette recordings that they'd already made, some at home and some in the music department of Leicester Polytechnic (this is where Sherree went to college) using grand pianos, marimbas, gongs, tubular bells, vibraphones and timpani which happened to be lying around there. The six songs on side one were all written by Alan and were selected from lots and lots of songs he'd written. If you think the ones on the record are bad you should hear the others, none of them have proper tunes and most of them are about squirrels - (Alan couldn't have sung them even if they did have proper tunes anyway). This didn't worry Alan though because, being a megalomaniac, if he was going to be involved with music at all he was going to make an L.P. with as many of his songs on it as possible - and plenty of guitar solos inspite of the fact that he could hardly play the guitar at all.
The Deep Freeze Mice called their record company Mole Embalming Records" and easily sold the first 250 copies of the L.P, called "My Geraniums are Bulletproof", which was released in November 1979. (This was towards the end of the period, just after the first punk era, when it was fashionable to be a small independent record company, and if the Mice took some of their records into such places as the Rough Trade shop in London they could count on selling a box or two). Next they used the money to press another five hundred copies, this time with a printed sleeve, and they signed a distribution deal. This turned out to be a bad idea because the company in question kept the records in their warehouse for a year, only sold 20 copies, and never paid the Mice any money at all. This meant that they couldn't afford to record another L.P. for over a year. Eventually they got the records back and sold them - mainly in Europe via exporters. It was re-released by Cordelia Records, the successor of Mole Embalming, in 1984 and has now sold about 2,000 copies altogether. It might have sold more if Cordelia Records could afford to keep re-pressing it.
The Deep Freeze Mice played their first ever gig at the Haddon Hall, Leeds in February 1980 supporting The Statics (who had changed their name to "The Subliminal Cut" by this time); Graham and Michael played in both bands. Shortly after this the Subliminal Cut broke up and Graham and Michael joined the Mice properly and they all went to live in Leicester. This was because Sherree was the last one to leave college so she had to stay in Leicester for the time being.
This is a fan site and is not managed by the band. Considering the Mice are out of commission since 1989 it's unlikely they'd use Myspace to promote themselves. Obviously, if they ever want to take over this page they're more than welcome to. If they insist on shutting it down, so be it. Let's hope they won't. If you wish to contact Alan Jenkins, you may do so through the Cordelia Records homepage.
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