Half Man Half Biscuit

Birkenhead’s greatest group. By Ian Harrison.

“...irksome celebrity, rock biz cliches, sporting minutiae...”

Forty years ago, Birkenhead teenager Nigel Blackwell went to watch his bass-playing future bandmate Neil Crossley’s punk group Venom. When they sang their sadly unrecorded protest anthem Working Class Victimisation, the words “Horseshoe Pass railway station” suddenly imprinted themselves on the song inside Blackwell’s mind.

It was a critical moment of improving comedic inversion, and its reverberations are still being felt in the output of his and Crossley’s group Half Man Half Biscuit. this autonomous, independent and unique vehicle’s story began 34 years ago with Back In The DHSS – a deadpan and witty halfhour of obscure pop-cultural references and equal-opportunities absurdism, sung with unaffected, north-western dryness and the possible influence of the Fall. John Peel loved it and its 1986 eP followup eP the trumpton riots, and so did his listeners: when the group called a halt soon after – blaming “musical similarities” and the danger of getting too big, too fast – it

nonetheless seemed like a conceit had run its course.

In fact, it hadn’t even begun. since returning to recording in

1991, Blackwell has refined his self-created world of satire both equable and trenchant, with the kind of unpredictable yet inevitable synaptic connections that provide enduring hilarity.

a frank regional voice, his subjects range freely over irksome celebrity, rock biz clichés, people who call their kids pretentious names, deep sporting minutiae and, most importantly, the erroneouslycelebrated whims of the middle classes. safe with Liverpool label veteran and former record shop magnate Geoff Davies’ Probe-Plus, it’s a model of sustainability, all locally sourced, artisan and quality controlled – notions that would be mocked in Blackwell’s polished observational gems, but their longevity has depended on it.

over the years, members have come and gone. Gigs are played (generally in driving distance of home). records are released, each one a source of intense delight to the initiated. others wax and wane, Blackwell doesn’t. Not much changes. thankfully.

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