The first and the last! The Safety Plan, and Natural Born Troublemaker...
Sunday, 26 September 2010
Friday, 24 September 2010
The Bikini Method Video!
So, I’ve been learning some new tricks and made a video to go with our new song The Bikini Method. I like to think of it as really hard to follow karaoke. It’s been shared a lot round the Facebook, which is a delightful turn of events, and is being generally well received by one and all, which makes us very happy, so a big thank you to everyone who has shared, retweeted, forwarded on, or just taken the time to watch it. We love you guys J
In the unlikely event that you’ve not seen it yet, then here it is for your viewing pleasure – we’d love to hear what you think, and if you like it, share it!
Sunday, 12 September 2010
Four Exclusive Preview Tracks From Physioterrorists
Wow, for reals? YEP! Four tracks from the forthcoming album available right now for your listening pleasure. And we do hope they bring you joy. Feel free to leave your thoughts, and to reshare them all around the intertubes for everyone to hear. The rest of the album won’t be long behind now, and at worst we imagine it will make an ideal Christmas gift for your loved ones.
Kobra Kai is probably the synthiest track on the album, and contains all sorts of juddering, dissonant surprises.
Better Homes And Gardens – the song that inspired our forthcoming musical “Robot Baby: Robo And Juliet”. And no, we’re not kidding. It’s a real project.
The Bikini Method. A guide to life, and when not to bother with it, cause you’re an oxygen thief. Not YOU, obviously. You’re lovely.
Lone Mouse In The Reptile House – everyone gets a bit lost sometimes, and sometimes you get lost in REALLY the wrong place. The fact is, you don’t have to outrun the lizards, you just have to outrun your companions. The greatest gift a friend can give you in a dangerous situation is “being a distraction”.
Monday, 30 August 2010
Tatty Bye, Kevline
Sadly, one of our number is leaving us. Young Kevline McGraw, the man who threw moving pictures into your face at shows, is departing the BBS train to focus on other commitments. We’ll be sorry to see his bearded head bobbing away into the distance, but good luck with all your shizz, Kevin. MWAH.
Friday, 20 August 2010
More Physioterrorist news...
Progress continues apace, and we’ve put together the graphics for the album cover, here’s a couple of samples for your eyes... the outside and inside of the CD booklet:
Thursday, 29 July 2010
Phase One Complete
Apart from a few odd bits of lyrics, the whole new album has been written! That’s right, 13 tracks of joy and wonder, just waiting for us to record them properly (which is of course Phase Two).
It’s been a long road to get this done, but now we’re ready to get it finished J You can expect a fair difference from Grim Maths – although it’s still the marvellous pop-electro-rock you’ve come to expect we have a more controlled sound on this one. Expect a lot of strings, obviously the pipes of lovely Lyndsey making word-sounds, and hopefully we’ll be adding a bunch of deeply erotic trumpet works from Ian, who featured on our remix of Asimov’s Laws Are Fucking Bullshit. SEXUAL.
So, I think we can safely say:
COMING SOON: BIKINI BLACK SPECIAL proudly present PHYSIOTERRORISTS, an album for anyone who’s got a broken ankle.
We’re gonna do it as a download, and maybe do a limited edition vinyl single which includes a free download of the album when you buy it. BONUS.
I’m so happy J
Phase One Complete
Apart from a few odd bits of lyrics, the whole new album has been written! That’s right, 13 tracks of joy and wonder, just waiting for us to record them properly (which is of course Phase Two).
It’s been a long road to get this done, but now we’re ready to get it finished J You can expect a fair difference from Grim Maths – although it’s still the marvellous pop-electro-rock you’ve come to expect we have a more controlled sound on this one. Expect a lot of strings, obviously the pipes of lovely Lyndsey making word-sounds, and hopefully we’ll be adding a bunch of deeply erotic trumpet works from Ian, who featured on our remix of Asimov’s Laws Are Fucking Bullshit. SEXUAL.
So, I think we can safely say:
COMING SOON: BIKINI BLACK SPECIAL proudly present PHYSIOTERRORISTS, an album for anyone who’s got a broken ankle.
We’re gonna do it as a download, and maybe do a limited edition vinyl single which includes a free download of the album when you buy it. BONUS.
I’m so happy J
Friday, 16 July 2010
Autotuned Meat Adventures
Anyone who was out our one big fringe gig a couple of years ago might remember this little ditty called "Made Of Meat" that we only played at that one gig. I knocked up a new version, with masses of autotune just to get up the nose of people who hate autotune, the tool it's hip to hate. Besides, it makes sense for non-meat lifeforms to have built in autotuning, since I couldn't actually sing in binary. The song is based on a short story by Terry Bisson, and the sample is from a short film of the short story. Anyways here it is, hope it brings a little autotuned smile to your day.
Monday, 5 July 2010
Progress report!
This is the most intensive writing we've done in ages - there are some advantages, it seems, to righteously fucking your leg up. So what new songs will we have for you on our triumphant return? WELL LOTS. So far, in the lineup for the new album, and new set that will go with it:
· Kafkaxanol
· The Bikini Method
· Kobra Kai
· Product X
· Pushing People Into Fast Moving Traffic
· Velociraptor
· The Safety Plan
· Lone Mouse In The Reptile House
· Citizen Pavlov
· They Know What I Did Last Summer
Die hard old school bikini fans may note a couple of old songs in there that have never made it to the output stage, and they’d be right, there are some tunes you never really want to let go of, and we’ve reinvented them a bit for this new album. For those who are interested in how we go about this stuff, we’ve taken a bit of an approach with this album – demoing everything as we go, and working with a sonic palette of “the sounds we can use” to reign in some of the excesses of the first album. It means all of this stuff sounds really consistent and together, which I like a lot.
Lyrically, everything is quite inspired (shockingly enough) by the accident, and the consequences of it – being trapped indoors, being stuck at the mercy of medical professionals who you find it harder to trust with extension of your sentence, and some of the songs are just odd stories that are clearly the product of being cooped up in a small space for too long.
It’s been a lot of fun getting Lyndsey more integrated into the band through doing all of this as well – having a whole bunch of new material she can stamp her own voice onto, rather than (at least in part) having to emulate those singers (and there are many) who have gone before her. For me, I feel like a new man from all this. With a new bone. And musically it feels like a reinvention, but one that knows where it came from. Maybe more of an evolution, or a growing up – though part of that actually seems to means letting rip and being a bit less serious in some of the songs.
Anyways, we still have a lot to do – there’s probably about five more songs to write to put together a body of work I’ll be happy with, and THEN we have to re-record everything properly. But based on what we have so far, I really believe it will be worth the wait, and we appreciate every last one of you sticking with us through the mishaps of late. We’re hoping to release the album as a download only, and also make a 7” vinyl single of two of the tracks, which will come with a free download code for the whole album. We’d like to hear your opinions on this plan, though – do you prefer a real CD, or do you find it really doesn’t matter to you anymore? Does a vinyl record sound special enough? I’ve always wanted to make one, so the idea appeals to me a lot – but you guys have all supported us and your opinions and ideas are always welcome.
Finally, we hope you all enjoyed the cover of Bjork’s “Hyperballad” we put out – we realised we’d not given you anything for a while, but we don’t want to spaff out our new material before it’s ready so we thought it would be a pleasant little amuse-bouche for you to put you on until dinner. We might well do another couple of those over the next few months – less polished little nuggets for you to snack on. Maybe there’s a song you’d love to hear our take on? Well let us know!
Well, this has turned into a longer blog post than we’d usually do, so I’ll knock it on the head here – oh, apart from to say PLEASE feel free to invite your facebook friends to join us on the Bikini Black Special facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/bikiniblackspecial) and hey, don’t be a stranger – we don’t bite.
Wednesday, 23 June 2010
Owls And Dinosaurs
Far across a distant sea
Upon the rocky shore
A tale was told of forbidden love
Between an owl and a dinosaur They first met at a party
In the dinosaur king's house
They dined on crabs and vol-eu-vents
And the occasional passing mouse The dinosaur, a mighty beast
Was forty three feet tall
And next to him, the tiny owl
Could barely be seen at all And yet this strange, unlikely pair
Fell in each other's groove
From then they were inseperable
... the townsfolk disapproved The dinosaur's friends said to him
"Love is the cruellest captor
But she's not for you, why don't you find
A nice velociraptor?" The family of the Owl agreed
Suggesting plainly that
They wouldn't accept a dinosaur spouse
Why not find herself a pussycat? But owl and dinosaur were not swayed
Whatever their friends said
They found a sinister minister
And demanded to be wed The town were all invited
And the wedding was quite a sight
The left side full of dinosaurs
And owls all to the right "Dearly beloved", the minister droned
"We're gathered here to see"
"An owl and a dinosaur joined together"
"In unlikely matrimony" At this the crowd could take no more
They couldn't keep it quiet
Instead of a dinosaur marrying an owl
There was going to be a riot But the dinosaur and the owl stood tall
And before the first pew was thrown
The dinosaur reached into his pocket
And retrieved a megaphone "NOW LISTEN", he bellowed, which hushed the crowd
"There's no need to squabble and shove
There's a reason we're here and I think it's quite clear
The owl and I are in love!" The crowd went "aww", their anger gone
Then sat down quiet and meek
And the owl flew up to the dinosaur
And pecked him on the cheek And so that day, the wedding done
The pair were husband and wife
They'd done their bit for previously strained interspecies relations
And got on with their life
Saturday, 10 April 2010
Asimov (Slowbot), feat. Ian Burgess!
We’ve been recording another of these alternative versions while Paddy mends his broken ankle, and while we’re writing a whole slew of new tunes for the new album (provisionally entitled Physioterrorists). Anyways, this is a version of Asimov’s Laws Are Fucking Bullshit (from Semi Automatic), and as a special treat we’ve employed the services of the dashing and talented Ian Burgess (formerly of Deadjim and Pterodactyls) on the trumpet. What a sexy horn he has. You can hear the track at the following link, and we’d love to get your thoughts and opinions.
www.wehaveyourmonkey.co.uk/mp3/bbs/Asimov (Slowbot Version).mp3
As a personal note, I like having this traditional, jazzy, mellow version of our only song with cusswords. It feels subversive. Oh, and thanks for bearing with us during this forced hiatus – we’ll be back in fighting form soon!
Sunday, 28 February 2010
Bikini Black And Blue Special
Good works, Paddy. You broke your ankle in three places, making something altogether gruesome. Sadly, this is going to slow down the BBS Bus temporarily, though there are still many things going on, and all sorts of super surprises in the pipeline.
Thursday, 18 February 2010
Why BBS Don't Have Children
If I ever have children I'm going to make it my life's work to mislead and deceive them. I want to go down in history as the man who produced the most fucked up kids the world ever saw. I will tell them that mummy is a killbot who's death circuit is activated by the tears of children. They will learn that if they want to cry, they must always cry alone. Her arms, I will say, transform into scythes for chopping off childrens' legs and fingers, and that that's why the garden is so well fertilised - with human blood. I will tell them that father christmas is a grey, wet man with nails for teeth and eyes like gimlets, who crawls down the chimney on sticky fingers like his limbs are broken, and who leaves presents but takes teeth in payment from one child in five with his tiny christmas hammer - and then skitters away leaving traces of smeared wet soot and a lingering odour of damp and gum disease. I will teach them the alphabet in the wrong order, and when their teacher tries to correct the damage I have done, I will tell them that their teacher is a murderer. I will say that she knows that children are ripe for harvesting when they do the alphabet her way, and then she wraps them up in carrier bags and leaves them in her crawlspace to die of thirst. I will tell them that stepping on cracks in the pavement gives them cancer, that chewing pencils causes their skin to become scaly and weep grease, and that eating vegetables will make their eyes swivel so they can only see their brain. I will tell them that all other children are controlled by brain parasites put in their ears by their parents under government instruction, and that I'm not going to put one in them but if the government finds out they will send people to cut them open without anaesthetic and see what makes them tick. I will tell them that cats carry a flesh-eating plague that will make their noses fall off, before slowly demolishing their faces and spiralling them into dementia as it feasts on their brains. They will be made aware that cats try to spread this disease because they are the natural enemy of the human race, and that people who keep cats are their zombie slaves. I will tell them that there is a race of cannibal creatures at large in the world, who love to feast on the bones of sleeping young. The cannibals sneak into bedrooms during the day and hide in mattresses, waiting for a child to fall asleep, then tear their way out to snatch with their bony, clawed fingers and sink their snaggled, uneven teeth into soft, yielding child-flesh. I will tell my children that the only way to be sure they won't fall prey to the cannibals is to stay awake as long as they can. I will tell them all this and more. It's a good job I'm not a parent.
Monday, 15 February 2010
Spreading The Bikini Word
It’s been lovely to see a whole bunch of new folks sign up on the facebook page of late (http://www.facebook.com/bikiniblackspecial), especially since we have a whole ton of sexy new surprises in the pipeline, including video, animation, danicing and free helicopter rides for selected participants. However, we would always like to see more of the attractive denizens of this fair internetland connected up to our ongoing stream of nonsense, so we’d really appreciate it if you Facebook folks would click “Suggest to friends” and pass on our link to them. They will probably feel forever in your debt and shower you with gifts, flowers, and unexpected kissing with tongues. So don’t delay, suggest us to a friend (or ten) today!
Sunday, 14 February 2010
A Bikini Black Valentine
Sorry about the repost, folks, just trying to get http://www.posterous.com working right J
Anyways, this is a valentine from BBS to all of you lovely fans. A valentine for those of you with inadequate home security and accessible crawlspaces. Don’t worry, we’re here. We’ll look after you, and watch you while you sleep. All we ask is that you don’t make a fuss when we take a lock of your hair in the night, or occasionally scrawl obscenities on your bathroom mirror with stolen lipstick. And the only reason we didn’t flush is because we didn’t want to wake you up, you’re so beautiful when you sleep.
Monday, 18 January 2010
The Singer Whisperer
Well, n00b. Specifically, our new singer! That's right folks, after a gruelling set of auditions we've found the future voice of BBS, in the form of Lyndsey Wilson. Now the task of breaking her spirit begins, much as one would break a horse. Fortunately, I am the singer whisperer.
Not really. Give her three months and she'll be slipping arsenic in my tea. But on the bright side... she'll still be making the tea.
Also, we've got a few writing/recording projects still lined up with some folks from other bands, so you can expect to hear at some point collaborations with Lorraine from The Feverdreamers, Mossy from Underdogs, Danny from Mindshock and more. Exciting times!
Not really. Give her three months and she'll be slipping arsenic in my tea. But on the bright side... she'll still be making the tea.
Also, we've got a few writing/recording projects still lined up with some folks from other bands, so you can expect to hear at some point collaborations with Lorraine from The Feverdreamers, Mossy from Underdogs, Danny from Mindshock and more. Exciting times!
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