The Wonderstuff
When The Wonder Stuff released their first album, The Eight
Legged Groove Machine, in 1988, the British press wrote
scores of articles about the band, mainly because of the
arrogant self-confidence of their leader, vocalist/guitarist
Miles Hunt.
Hunt's brash public image was The Wonder Stuff personified -
mean, self-satisfied, self-serving and scathingly witty.
Accordingly, their colourful mixture of pop melodies, loud
guitars, sneering lyrics, and touches of dance music was
sometimes brilliant and sometimes banal.
Between 1988 and 1993, the West Midlands band kept
incorporating more stylistic flourishes to their basic punk and
new wave-inspired pop/rock. The band were instant stars in
England but America never warmed to their music.
Rob Jones left the band in December 1989 and moved to the US.
He passed away in 1993.
After trying to gain a worldwide audience for five years -
and duetting with comedian Vic Reeves on a version of Dizzy which
reached Number One in 1991 - the band broke up in July
1994.
They reformed again in 2000 and a line-up of some kind
(always with Hunt) has existed almost permanently since.
Drummer Martin Gilks was killed in a motorcycle accident in
London in April 2006.
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