CUD: Hey!Wire (7″, Imaginary MIRAGE 018, ?)

Yet another Cud record – the third one I’ve written about on here. This was never meant to be a Cudblog, but you can’t argue with the orders of a random number generator. Ever wondered how I decide which record I’m going to write about each time? No? Never? Well, I’m going to tell you anyway. I use a random number generator that is, apparently, a ‘True’ Random Number Service. According to the website:

The randomness comes from atmospheric noise, which for many purposes is better than the pseudo-random number algorithms typically used in computer programs.

So there. That could be absolute, one hundred per cent garbage, but I’m easily taken in by pseudo- or even real scientific explanations for things that I always thought were very simple.

This record is a one-sided seven inch, a format I like. It focuses the attention on, usually, a single song, and it also means that there is a delicious expanse of virgin vinyl to contemplate. Like some treacly, shimmering icing rink it stares back at you, promising everything and nothing in the depths of its vinylcular soul. Know what I mean? And don’t get me started on one-sided twelve inch records – that expanse is almost too much to bear at times.

The sleeve for the record states, as you can see, ‘Another Imaginary Records Red Hot 45 Limited Edition’ – I’d hazard a guess that Imaginary actually meant it, and that there weren’t more than 1,000 of these pressed at most. Interesting to compare that with the ‘limited edition’ Cud releases that would later come out on A&M: those generally being pressings of around 500,000 or something (okay, maybe not that many but not far off). Limited in a very strange sense.

CUD: Purple Love Balloon (12″, A&M AMY 0024, 1992)

So here’s the second Cud record I’ve written about on here thus far: I think they’re the first band to achieve this dubious honour. It’s not particularly a surprise, as I have a lot of Cud records. I’m sure that more will be mentioned here. In fact, I even have two formats of this release – the twelve-inch you see above as well as the seven-inch release. True fandom, is that not?

As with the previously-mentioned Cud record, this one is from the time when A&M were liberally showering them with money to wrap their releases in all kinds of gimmickry. As such this one is on clear vinyl, it’s numbered (a ‘limited edition’ of something like 10,000 copies…) and it comes along with a push-out-the-pieces Cud mobile, lovingly illustrated by Jamie Hewlett of Tank Girl – and later Gorillaz – fame. My push-out-the-pieces mobile has its pieces firmly un-pushed, by the way.

Related story: as a spirited teenager doing an A-Level art class, I was asked to produce a poster to ‘advertise a product’. Naturally I put together an A2 poster promoting Cud’s then-recent song ‘Eau Water’, lovingly hand-rendered with a beatifully-illustrated tap and flowing water, created using an actual paint-and-compressed-air airbrush. Yes, these were the days before Photoshop ran the world. Proper, this-takes-hours-longer-than-it-really-should, art!

CUD: Once Again (12″, A&M AMY 0081, 1992)

I used to bleedin’ love Cud between the years of around 1990-1994. They were one of the first bands that saw me diligently buying every single release they put out, whilst constantly scouring record shops for their earlier work. Remember those days before eBay when it actually took some time and effort to build up a record collection?

This 12″ is from their A&M days, after they’d bizarrely hit the big time – or, well, the small time, at least. ‘Bizarrely’ because they were always a bit of a weird outsider band, and just seemingly not normal enough to really make it, despite some superb songs and a brilliant (if deranged) frontman. Gone were their limited releases on Imaginary Records, distributed in hard-to-find places – these were their days of national press, big tours, and what seemed like endless marketing money to spend on freebies and gimmicks. This record, for example, comes with a free poster, which is a pretty straightforward trick – but other A&M Cud releases came with, off the top of my head, a set of commemorative stamps; a three-dimensional cardboard house; and some kind of cut-out-the-eyeholes face mask. Then, as so often happens when the industry steps in to ‘help,’ they were gone as quickly as they were famous.

A friend of mine played a gig recently with the now-reformed Cud, and said it was a mix of nostalgia and pain – nostalgia at the obvious thrill of seeing a great old band playing some great old songs; pain at it being fifteen years later with no apparent forward movement from the band and, most awkwardly, the fans. The fans aren’t the young blades they once were any more; it’s all ‘a night off from the kids’ nowadays and an excuse to work on an already-expanded beer gut. (Not in my case of course; I don’t have kids).

Here’s a true fact: I once met William Potter from Cud at a comics convention in London – he was at the event representing his cartooning as part of the Deadline magazine team. He drew me a picture. That same day I also got pictures from Jamie Hewlett (you know, the guy that did Tank Girl and then Gorillaz), Raymond Briggs (you know, the guy that did The Snowman and When The Wind Blows) and Dave Gibson (you know, the guy that did Watchmen). I was in awe of these meetings back then, and in fact am still now…