Friday 29 July 2011

Absolutely opus

Another find courtesy of our good friend and WWR field rep Ross Hamilton, this has to be one of the most insane things ever committed to vinyl.

Released by Decca records as the b-side to Desperate Dan, the follow up to Lieutenant Pigeon's worldwide smash (and UK number 1) Mouldy Old Dough, Opus 300 features a distorted drum beat (sampled directly from Mouldy Old Dough by the sound of it), the word 'mother' repeated ad nauseum, a short calypso bridge which features the bizarre lyric: 'get your shoes from the menders and don't be late' and a spot of manic, Python-esque laughter.

As if that were not enough, this little piece of insanity was put out by a group which consisted of three hairy blokes from Coventry - Rob Woodward, Nigel Fletcher and Steve Johnson - and Rob's mum Hilda! It's totally nuts, yet still somehow managed to help propel its a-side to number 17 in the UK charts.

Lieutenant Pigeon are still around today, of sorts, having reformed in the early 90s, although none of the original members take part in its current incarnation. In 2001 the band released a follow up to Opus 300 entitled Opus 400 which lasts for over half an hour. No thank you; two minutes and seven seconds of this nonsense is more than enough for me.

Enjoy!

3 comments:

  1. Ain't nothin' like a good throwaway B-side, is there, Cap'n?!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I have this record too. The other side isn't quite as bad as this, i'm going to post it on my little two-bit blog right now. Thanks (i think) for reminding me that i had it.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Is that backmasking at the start?

    ReplyDelete

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