With
the American tour finally over, the band
flew back to the UK at the beginning of
March and took a few days off prior to their
Manchester appearance - their first major UK
headlining performance in over two years.
During the break, both Malc and Martin Gilks
decided to get their hair cut with both
opting for extremely short styles.
For the
first time in their career, the group
arranged a sponsor for the UK tour, linking
up with XD Lager. The deal allowed the drink
to be sold at a cheaper rate at licensed
venues and, upon purchase of any drink, a
plastic cup bearing the group's and XD's
logos was given to the buyer. Discount
vouchers were also given out that enabled
recipients to purchase the 'Construction For
The Modern Idiot' album at a reduced price
and also receive a promotional poster for
the album. It was a move that angered some
of the other group members and caused
further internal tension.
Around the
time of arranging their UK tour, Miles had
wanted to change a lot of aspects within the
band; their booking agency, publicist, parts
of their management team and their lawyers -
"I'd find myself sitting in the office of
our studio, just sitting there like a
businessman, phoning up the manager and the
record company, waiting until four to phone
up the American manager - I enjoyed getting
into the business side again, shouting and
getting shouted back at. I stuck two months
of that into the end of 'On The Ropes',"
says Miles.
MANCHESTER APOLLO - 08/03/94
...Truth is, The Wonder Stuff
have friends rather than fans; a
bevy of followers who know all
Miles' obsessions in and out,
who punch the air to violin
solos and who cheer when the
word "idiot" is projected onto
the speaker stacks, who
understand the dedication
preceding 'Piece Of Sky' to "old
friends who aren't here anymore"
and who don't mind that 'Dizzy'
is omitted. Hosts of hands grab
out every time our favourite
gobshite crosses the front of
the stage: Evan Dando can only
dream of being so desired.
The fierce intensity of tonight
never lets up, from a barked
'Change Every Lightbulb' to the
barking mad perennial closer
'Good Night Though'. The shorts
might be getting longer, the
hair may be receding, but the
anger - always the real driving
force - remains. It's a bit
surprising, too: after all,
haven't the bastards gone all
mature on us? Where were the
songs on 'Construction For The
Modern Idiot' about crap
girlfriends and hating your
mates? Since when was Charles
Bukowski on the A-level reading
list? And exactly how much did
those jumpers in the 'Full Of
Life' video cost?
After ten minutes you stop
caring about all that and
remember why it was that you
always loved them so much
before: for the simple, clichéd
reason that they've always made
more sense on stage than
anywhere else. New songs are
infused with a brilliant verve
(even affording comic moments in
the form of an impromptu reading
of 'A Great Drinker'); old songs
sound nothing short of ace.
'Golden Green' and 'Don't Let Me
Down, Gently', two of the
greatest singles of the '80s,
roll by in a flurry of
reminiscences and bursting
grins, while the departure of
Fiddly marks "a collection of
songs from when we all had long
hair": 'No, For The 13th Time',
'A Wish Away', 'Red Berry Joy
Town'... all the staples of
student discotheques. "Isn't it
a bit sad doing all this stuff?"
asks Miles. "NO!" bellow 3,000
damp people, unanimously.
Emma Morgan, New Musical Express |
Shortly
before the group were due to play for their
second night at Manchester's Apollo came the
news that American poet Charles Bukowski had
died in Los Angeles of leukaemia. Due to the
current wave of publicity surrounding the
Stuffies, many subsequent articles which
told of Bukowski's death also mentioned
Hunt's interest in the man and the inclusion
of the 'A Great Drinker' tribute track on
their latest album. By way of a tribute to
the dead poet, the track was bought properly
into the set-list with Miles dedicating the
track to him at each performance. Two other
tracks were also added, 'Hot Love Now!' -
their next single - and a cover of The
Waterboys' 'Fisherman's Blues'.
To coincide
with the British dates, the 'Hot Love Now!'
EP was released on March 14th. Continuing
the tradition of the last two EP releases it
featured two new tracks plus another track
from the 'Welcome To The Cheap Seats'
soundtrack, 'Room 512, All The News That's
Fit To Print' . A second four track CD
single was also released which was housed in
a numbered box to also hold the first disc.
This featured three additional tracks
(again, one taken from the '...Cheap seats'
soundtrack) and a remix of 'Hot Love Now!',
this time with an orchestral backing. Miles
originally wanted the London Philharmonic
Orchestra to appear on the track when they
had first recorded it and, though it's not
the London Philharmonic that play on the
track, this version went some way to
fulfilling his ideas.
Live dates
went well, though tempers were plainly
short. In a repeat of the Europe '88 tour,
Miles looked bored and uninterested most
nights at having to play the same set of
songs time and time again. The band's
mammoth 2½ hour set at Leicester's Granby
Halls on March 17th was recorded (and
edited) for later broadcast by BBC Radio 1FM
and featured 'Like A Merry Go Round' for the
first time in a number of years. Dates
continued across the country, playing to
packed venues most nights, but Miles'
dissatisfaction & unhappiness refused to go
away. Arguments raged between the group
members and their touring entourage. Miles
was reported as being bored, uninterested
and fed up with everything. At one point,
Russ countered that 4,000 people had paid
£10 each to see him sing most nights and he
really should be a little more concerned. "I
don't care," was his brother's apparent
reply.
After only
an hour into the show in Glasgow on the 25th
of March, Miles stormed offstage at the end
of 'Donation' having lost his voice, though
it is rumoured that something much more
serious was afoot. The group showed no signs
of returning and there were ugly, violent
scenes in the crowd. The following night's
performance was initially postponed, then
cancelled altogether. To ease relations, the
band agreed to appear at Glasgow's Tramway,
as part of Radio 1FM's Sound City event, on
April 5th.
Following
two shows at Birmingham's Aston Villa
Leisure Centre, tempers reached boiling
point in Gloucester on April 4th. The
atmosphere within the Wonder Stuff camp had
been sour for many months and however well
disguised everyone's disquiet had been, it
had now been bought out into the public view
- something needed to be done about it. A
short backstage meeting at the venue prior
to the gig between the band, management,
road crew and Polydor's representatives to
clear the air brought events to a head.
Miles said that he didn't want to tour
anymore with the current album and had no
intention of travelling to contracted dates
in Australia, Japan and the Far East during
May and June. "I kept saying 'I don't want
to go to Japan with you lot' and they
replied 'That's fine we don't want to go
with you anyway!'," Miles later told Gary
Crowley - host of ITV's The Beat programme.
Malcolm
felt that the group were moving in different
directions and then Martin Gilks made his
intentions clear - he didn't want to play
the music anymore and didn't really want to
tour. Being a father to two children with a
full time job was hard enough, but when that
job involved travelling across the world for
months at a time it made it even harder. He
wanted to quit after a contracted appearance
at the Phoenix festival but was prepared to
continue the tour in the meantime. Echoing Malc's feelings, Martin Bell also expressed
unhappiness at the band's current direction.
He wanted to explore opportunities in
providing soundtrack material for film and
TV as a more-lucrative session musician than a full-time band member. Bell had often
supplemented his income with incidental
music for television soundtracks and as a
result of the group's touring commitments,
had been forced to refuse large amounts of
work and was adamant that a less intense
touring schedule should be undertaken in
future - if indeed there was a future.
Miles felt
that if Martin and Fiddly were planning to
leave, there wouldn't really be much of a
Wonder Stuff left. In the heat of the
moment, someone suggested a split after the
Phoenix Festival - it was agreed.
Outstanding overseas tour commitments were
cancelled amidst confusion and secrecy. Only
one contracted appearance - July's Phoenix
Festival - would be honoured following the
final UK date of the Idiot Manoeuvres Tour
at London's Brixton Academy on April 22nd as
the Phoenix date had been agreed with the
band since January, and a portion of the
band's appearance fee had already been paid.
Talking
about the split to Gary Crowley, Miles
added: "That was it. The deal was done in
half an hour. Then it was all smiles and we
went down the pub." In an interview
broadcast a few months later on BBC Radio
1FM, Miles continued by saying "I remember
walking on stage at Gloucester thinking
'this is going to be brilliant' and I
remember halfway through the first song just
turning round to Fiddly, and Martin Gilks
especially, and just having the biggest grin
on my face thinking 'this is fantastic' and
the grin was returned and the gig was
probably one of the best ones of the tour
because there was some honesty going
around."
As Miles
himself remembers feeling heartbroken by The
Jam's public decision to split in 1982, it
was felt that the decision should be kept
secret until the Phoenix Festival itself.
The road crew were informed that their
services would be no longer required as of
July and were told to accept any offers made
to them by other bands for future tours.
Promoters abroad were contacted, and the
band's management in America were informed
of the split. It was to be one of the worst
kept secrets in the music industry. A few
nights later, at their Newport gig, members
of the audience calling for more of the old
material to be played received the reply
from Miles, "If we split, remember that it
was because you want us just to play the old
stuff, don't you?" Promotional appearances
at various HMV record stores around the UK
to coincide with the tour were cancelled at
short notice and a live slot on BBC-TV's Top
Of The Pops to perform 'Hot Love Now!' was
abandoned - Miles apparently had the flu
though some of the music press later
reported that it was purely because no-one
could be bothered.
Following
the decision to split, the band cut their
live set from two hours to around 80 minutes
and played a series of shows ranging from
excellent to average. Miles was obviously
unconcerned about the band, visibly slurring
and forgetting words at Poole's Arts Centre
on April 11th - only really becoming
animated when the band performed a cover of
The Psychedelic Furs' 'Into You Like A
Train'. At Reading's Rivermead, the group
were joined onstage by support act The
Gigolo Aunts' guitarist - though his
presence was only really noticeable during
the usually whistled section of 'A Great
Drinker'. Miles also began counting down the
number of shows left but by the time the tour
bus arrived in Brixton for the final three
shows of the tour on April 20th, he seemed in much better spirits. "Great", he was
reported to say, "Only four shows to go!"
For these final performances, the band
exhumed early tracks 'It's Not True' and
'Poison' and were also joined on stage by Vic
Reeves for 'Dizzy'.
STUFFED
The Wonder Stuff have called it
a day. A terse press release
announced that the band has
decided to split up on 'very
amicable terms', or as the band
themselves apparently put it,
"just for the fuck of it."
Their last appearance will be at
The Phoenix Festival on July
15th. Rumours that the band were
despairing of their label have
been squashed with news that
they will be working with
Polydor on the release of a
singles compilation later this
year. Seems there is also the
possibility of a live album.
The strangest rumour surrounding
the Stuffies split is the
unsubstantiated claim that Miles
Hunt instigated the break up in
order to launch a career as a
motorcycle courier!
Brum Beat |
The first
public leak of the split came in mid-May
when their American manager, Steve Rennie,
announced in The Gavin Report, an American
college magazine, that the group were on the
verge of splitting. When pressed about the
matter further, he confirmed he would be
attending "the funeral" (as he described it)
at the Phoenix Festival. A week later, on
Thursday May 19th, the group issued a short
statement confirming that they were
splitting up "for the fuck of it." The
statement went on to say that any rumours of
the group being at odds with their record
company were unfounded and that, following
their final performance at the Phoenix
Festival, a greatest hits compilation album
would be released.
Following
on from Gilks and Malc, Miles was featured
in the June issue of Loaded magazine
sporting his new short hairstyle. The last
photograph in the article was of his hair,
neatly arranged over the back of the
barber's chair. Though not his idea
initially but the magazine's, a quote from
the article reads "My hair was the main
thing people recognised me by. If I tied it
back I could walk through a Wonder Stuff gig
unnoticed, so now there's no more band I've
got rid of the hair as well." When asked
later about the reason for having it all cut
off, he also added "I spent ten years
looking like a nonce and now I've decided to
say hello to the '90's' followed by his
plans for the immediate future of "Getting
me feet up and working out how to make a
living. I used to pick litter at the NEC
before the band."
In an
attempt to compensate for the cancellation
of the group's touring commitments to
Australia and Japan, Polygram issued a new
pressing of the 'Construction For The Modern
Idiot' CD which contained a second disc
featuring six tracks recorded at their Town
and Country Club appearance at Leeds on
March 12th - 'Change Every Light Bulb',
'Cabin Fever', 'Piece Of Sky', 'The Size Of
A Cow', 'Can't Shape Up', and 'Hush'.
Organised
by The Mean Fiddler organisation, the
Phoenix Festival first began in 1993 and was
held in mid-July at the Long Marston
Airfield, near Stratford-upon-Avon in
Warwickshire. Stretching to Britain's first
ever four day festival for 1994, the line-up
included Killing Joke, Paul Weller, Carter
USM, Pop Will Eat Itself, Iggy Pop and many
more. The Stuffies were headliners on the
main stage for the Friday night, following
on from Carter, The Fall, Squeeze, and Jah
Wobble.
Arriving on
the Thursday night, the group handed the
keys over to staff from Loaded and proceeded
to get drunk - a state which some managed to
maintain for the entire length of the
festival. Even before Miles had been
featured having his haircut, the group had
often had a close association with the
magazine as one time contributor and now, at
time of writing, editor of the magazine was
fan, friend and former NME journalist James
Brown. The magazine also featured regular
contributions from Hunt's wife, Mary Anne
Hobbs before she left to pursue a successful
career on BBC Radio One primarily as a
night-time DJ though occasionally providing
daytime cover for holidaying or unwell
regular DJ's.
Prior to
The Wonder Stuff stepping on stage, errant
'entrepreneurs' could be found trawling
around the festival site selling what they
were claiming to be genuine locks of Miles'
recently shorn hair. At three pounds for an
envelope full, someone was both making a
fair bit of money and also possibly
misleading the public as there was rather
suspicious amount of the stuff for sale
around the ground.
For all its
significance, the Phoenix performance must
go down as being one of the best gigs of
their entire career. Although Miles had said
that he didn't care whether they played or
not - just so long as it ended - they
blasted their way through nearly two hours
of great tracks leaving those watching
having no doubt that, along with the suicide
of Nirvana's Kurt Cobain, the demise of The
Wonder Stuff would be one of the events of
the year. For the last time, the audience
were treated to 'Mission Drive', 'Golden
Green', 'Cabin Fever' and 'Unbearable'.
'Piece Of Sky' rightfully reminded us of Bob
Jones, 'It's Not True' recalled the start of
the group and Miles' best ever one-liner was
saved until last. Straight from the Johnny
Rotten book of phrases, and in his best
impression of the man, prior to final song
'Good Night Though' he asked us, "Ever feel
like you've been treated?" Without a shadow
of a doubt, a treat had been had by all -
not only in the final hours of the group's
existence - "Don't come and ask us for our
autographs. We're nobodies as of twelve
o'clock" - but throughout the eight years of
three minute in-your-face pop songs.
After the
gig, the organisers of the festival showed
an interview with Miles - conducted by
members of the on-site television crew - on
a large screen situated just outside the
stage area. Being decidedly cagey about what
the future held for each of the individual
members, he confirmed that he had been
approached by MTV to become a presenter on
the channel's Sunday evening Indie music
show, 120 Minutes - taking over for a trial
period from ex-chart star, Paul King.
He went on
to rubbish claims in the NME that he would
be working with Ange Dolittle of Eat, who
had also recently announced their
disbandment though he did however suggest
the possibility that Malc may be working
with Ange in the future and, jokingly, said
that any result would definately be more
dance-oriented. Of the other members, he
said that Fiddly was working on soundtrack
material for film and television whilst
Clifford and Gilks had not yet made any
plans.
Following
their final performance the group remained
at the festival, watching the other acts and
basically enjoying themselves. Miles
continued drinking before joining Vic
Reeves' backing band, The Images Of Cream,
backstage in a special Artists Jamming tent
to briefly return to playing on the drums
until the early hours of morning when whilst
still drunk, he attempted to climb a section
of the perimeter fencing around the site
resulting in a visit to the on-site medical
surgery with a lacerated index finger.
Two weeks
later, Miles began hosting MTV's 120 Minutes
with his thumb still bandaged. This was not
the first time that he had been a VJ (video
jockey) however as he had appeared on MTV
America a number of times previously.
Meanwhile, on ITV's The Beat programme,
excerpts from the Phoenix show were
broadcast whilst Polydor prepared for the
release of a video of the Phoenix show to
coincide with the 'best of' album.
At the end
of August, 'Unbearable' was re-released.
Using the same image as the original issue
but with different colouring, the standard
releases on seven inch, cassette and CD
contained the album version of Unbearable,
plus two previously commercially unreleased
tracks taken from the 'Never Loved Elvis'
demos of '89 and '90. One track was their
cover of Pop Will Eat Itself's 'Inside You',
featuring Bob Jones on bass (as can be found
on the Cartoon Boyfriend US promo single),
and the other was the excellent 'Hit By A
Car' - of which an instrumental version,
renamed 'Hit By A Piano', appears as a piece
of background music in the 'Welcome To The
Cheap Seats' video.
A second CD
single was also released, this time in the
same colours as the original release, which
contained the four tracks off the original
'Unbearable' 12" EP.
At
the end of September, The Wonder Stuff's
greatest hits compilation 'If The Beatles
Had Read Hunter' was released. The
reasoning behind the unusual title was a
theory that the Stuffies are what The
Beatles may have sounded and looked like if
they had been influenced by American
novelist Hunter S. Thompson's, especially if
they'd have read his 'Fear And Loathing In
Las Vegas' novel. Some promotional cassettes
of the album made the title a little clearer
as they were titled 'The Singles (Had The
Beatles Read Hunter)', though when and why
the title was changed is unknown.
Whatever
they called it, many poured scorn on the
title - controversial to the end - but the
album was hailed as near perfection. Once
you'd clambered over the title you were
confronted with every single that they'd
released, delving into the archives for
'It's Not True' right up to 'Hot Love Now!',
with their cover of Slade's 'Coz I Luv You'
thrown in for good measure. Preferring not
to use a chronological track listing, the
running order was designed so that no two
singles from the same album were together.
However, promotional posters for the album
showed a different running order for the
last six tracks, in which 'Full Of Life
(Happy Now)' and 'On The Ropes' followed
each other - these posters are now extremely
hard to find.
Climbing
high in the album charts, reaching number
three like it's two predecessors, it was
soon joined by 'Greatest Hits Finally Live'
- a video of the entire Phoenix concert.
The video's
release was delayed by a couple of weeks due
to a change in it's content. Promotional
advertisements circulated at the Phoenix
Festival had said that the release would
contain a complete recording of the final
gig plus the videos to all of the singles.
Realising that this would have required a
video running to over three hours, and
considering the fact that twelve of the
sixteen tracks for which videos had been
made were already commercially available,
the eventual release contained only the live
performance.
GREATEST HITS FINALLY LIVE
So this was it. The swansong of
one of England's finest pop
bands who bowed out at Phoenix
Festival just for the fuck of
it.
Only The Wonder Stuff could have
timed it so badly, playing a
final gig at the UK's cheesiest
pop festival where tickets cost
£52 and you had to find a field
in bloody Stratford-upon-Avon to
see it. But hey! Johnny Paycheck
made it worth their while and
besides, they didn't want to
outstay their welcome after the
disappointment of 'Construction
For The Modern Idiot'.
'Finally Live' is a smarter buy
than the Stuffies 'If The
Beatles Had Read Hunter' singles
album, running in at 28 tracks
and capturing some of the fun of
the gig. On record you don't get
the customary arrogance of Miles
Hunt: "Don't anyone give me the
argument about the cameras, I
don't give a fuck about 'em," or
the weird-beard smiles of axe
hero Malc Treece.
On video you can revel in the
splendour of Vic Reeves' idiot
dance through 'Dizzy' and the
momentous Bob Jones tribute
'Piece Of Sky', where Miles
grins throughout and you're sure
The Bass Thing is watching from
rock 'n' roll cloud central
wishing he was here.
"So I guess this is goodbye,"
ends Miles at encore three. Dead
right, but it was fun while it
lasted.
Andy Richardson, New Musical
Express |
And that
was the end - their final planned release
for Polydor Records. As the album was being
reviewed, people were asking "Was this
really it?". There had been disagreements
before - they'd split up once before only to
get back together with even more grit and
determination but sadly, this time it was to
be permanent. Everyone dropped out of the
public eye, except for Miles who was still
hosting 120 Minutes on MTV Europe and also
DJ'ed at a couple of Birmingham night-clubs.