Extra curricular help from Alison (the Eighteenth Day of May/The Left Outsides), Jim Reid (Jesus and Mary Chain), Alasdair (The Clientele), Rob (Silver Springs), Long Johnny Silver, George Phillips (Sister Vanilla), Abishek Joshi (Elmore), Ben Lurie (Jesus and Mary Chain) and Neil Wissink.
Never forgotten: Graham Melia
Influences
The Jesus and Mary Chain, Beach Boys, Neil Young, Felt, Dexy's, Whiskeytown, Throwing Muses, Lee Hazlewood, Clinic, Pixies, The Archies...
"If you thought of the ideal elements for a band, Tompaulin would come pretty close. But you probably wouldn't imagine the chip on the their shoulder beneath their winsome charm."
Betty Clarke, The Guardian (Read the review)
Tompaulin formed in a bedroom in Blackburn, Lancashire in 1999. We loved records and wanted to make our own. Our first single was self-financed and released on a local label, Action Records. We had never even played live when 'Ballad of the Bootboys' sold out in a week. We borrowed some money and recorded another two singles with our friend Vinny Peculiar in Liverpool. 'Slender' and 'It’s a Girl’s World' also sold out very quickly. We were in the NME and all the music papers, and everyone contacted us wanting to sign, represent, remix and re-define us. We didn’t have a clue what was going on. Simon didn’t even have an amp. Vinny used to lend us all his stuff.
We signed to Uglyman Records in a pub in Blackburn. Guy Lovelady was the only person who came to Blackburn to see us and we were fed up with going to London every week. So we signed and made an LP, 'The Town and the City,' with him. It got good press and favourable radio play for the single, resulting in two Peel sessions and a gig at Glastonbury. More people came to see us live and we continued to receive great press and reviews, except we were surrounded by people who talked about units and strategies, features and angles and while all this was going on, the world went Strokes and White Stripes mad. Our manager told us we were finished.
We didn’t feel finished.
We contacted Jim Reid from our beloved Jesus and Mary Chain records and went in the studio and recorded a new EP.
'Give Me a Riot in the Summertime' did very well for us, the Guardian Guide said we were on to something and we thought so too. We compiled all our singles on a CD we called 'Everything was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt.' Chris Roberts, writing for Uncut called it, "A revelation."
With the money we made from that we bought a small studio of our own and recorded 'Into The Black.' We asked Jim Reid back, this time to sing on 'Seams.' The Clientele, Ben Lurie (JAMC) and loads of other people came in to hang out and help and we had a good time recording it, despite the downbeat tone of the record.
Mojo and Uncut gave it four stars and all the usual press loved it, except the NME who ignored it.
The record label said, "Can’t hear a single."
We were fiercely proud of 'Into The Black' and decided to start playing live after two years off. We toured Germany and Scandinavia to sold out shows and came home to headline a sold out 'POW! To the People' mini-festival for Track and Field at the Barfly in London.
Then we split up.
Simon is the brains and brawn behind Soup Studio. His last recording was The Wave Pictures single. Everyone seems to love it.
He is also a member of
Mathew Sawyer and The Ghosts, has been in Darren Hayman's band and was a founder member of Hayman, Watkins, Trout and Lee, a bluegrass band whose debut LP is out now on Fortuna Pop! If you've bought an indie single recorded in London this year, I bet you a tenner Simon recorded it or is in the band.
"So when the skies are scorched and war no longer pays, our planet like a tree will dry up and fade away. Then our powerful leaders will retreat behind their walls, but who will save our children when the last leaf falls?" DARFUR - A war let happen over climate change.
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Just to let you know, I am gratified by your adding my profile page to your collection of myspace friends. What's more, it pleases me greatly to have such a noteoworthy profile page such as yours in my collection.
By the way, people deeply involved in the lively arts have complimented me for The CORLEONE MANIFESTO. With your permission, I should like to impart its complete and concise text in this comment:
01 .. we are stuck on this planet ..
02 .. we are stuck with this earth's limited resources ..
03 .. we are stuck with each other ..
04°. what's above our heads and what's underneath our feet are small matters, compared to what is within us ..
.... ¹ gratis "he who is known as sefton" ... plus another way of saying, "man proposes, God disposes".
..
I think Brautigan would approve ...
.... alright, already, he was a Communist. Even so, Woody Guthrie said it best. A song is better than a pamphlet. A pamphlet gets read once, twice maybe, and then gets stuck away. A song, on the other hand, can get sung over and over again.
"Masculine Islam, the rule of the Just, Egyptian sand dunes and geometry, A theology of rifle-butts and executions: These are the places where the spirit dies. And now, in Desertmartin's sandy light, I see a culture of twigs and bird-shit Waving a gaudy flag it loves and curses. "
i hope you and yours escaped all the floods in england lately btw.. "when the night comes like a thief, and pours like ink into these empty streets, there is nothing you can do...." into the black has been on long play a bit lately.. and the recent climate has rewritten some of the songs into a new context on me. truly great album though. i don't think i'll ever tire of it.
Hiya - we've got The Wave Pictures & Trevor Moss & Hannah-Lou (Indigo Moss) down at The Gladstone on Thursday for Acoustic Suicide - hope to see you there! Free entry as always...
