13 Dec 2009 by Chris     No Comments    Posted under: Entertainment

Albums of the Decade: No.8

Trouble Over Bridgwater by Half Man Half Biscuit

“Late Lunch audience, we’ve got all your addresses!”

Was there ever a finer album title in history? And Trouble Over Bridgwater, released in 2000, doesn’t disappoint on the song front either. There are as many obscure pop-cultural references per square inch as in any of the band’s albums, but there are also some great ideas, from the concept of wanting keep a girl “mathematically safe” to ranting about ignorant staff at all-night garages. And more than in any other Half Man Half Biscuit record, there’s a theme of irritation with the music industry. Irk The Purists reminds people that they don’t have to be told what to like; Look Dad No Tunes points the finger at career indie bands; and Used To Be In Evil Gazebo ridicules the tortured souls of songwriting.

Above all, however, Trouble Over Bridgwater will make you laugh, if only at the obscurity of the references and the fact that you “got” them.
Singing Sealed Knot Society, let’s see you try and do this one:
Luton Town – Millwall, nineteen eighty-five

• Albums of the Decade: No.9
• Albums of the Decade: No.10
• Albums of the Decade: No.11
• Albums of the Decade: No.12
• Albums of the Decade: No.13
• Albums of the Decade: No.14
• Albums of the Decade: No.15
• Albums of the Decade: No.16
• Albums of the Decade: No.17
• Albums of the Decade: No.18
• Albums of the Decade: No.19
• Albums of the Decade: No.20

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