The Half Man Half Biscuit Lyrics Project

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149 pop songs picked over by pedants!

Half Decent Articles about HMHB

Occasionally I’ve come across a decent article about Half Man Half Biscuit which I’d never discovered before. You may well have done the same. Anyway, here’s your chance to give the article a small but perfectly-formed little piece of publicity. Feel free to add one you’ve written yourself. (Note: Don’t worry if you don’t know the code to make links work, I’ll tidy it up.)

23 Letters Sent:
  1. I’ll kick things off with An Illustrated Guide To… Half Man Half Biscuit on Sweeping The Nation

  2. …Kevin Sampson’s Taking The Biscuit from The Guardian

  3. …Mike Wade’s fantastic blog entry Dean Friedman bites the Biscuits

  4. …the 2005 career retrospective Half Man Half Biscuit on Spank The Monkey

  5. Dave F.

    Hi Chris

    Aren’t these all linked on Gez’s site?

    In your first link it claims only two TV appearances. Is that right?
    I can think of three at the moment:
    OGWT.
    Tube
    a Saturday morning football show (I forget it’s name)

    Any others?

  6. By “Gez’s site” do you mean http://www.hmhb.co.uk? If so, I’m sure these articles (and many more) are indeed linked to from there, but I started this page so that people can add to the list, which you can’t do on the otherwise admirable hmhb.co.uk. Also, the articles will all be listed on one page – finding them on hmhb.co.uk is a rather daunting prospect.

  7. A J Smith

    they famously didn’t actually appear on The Tube though, since they refused a helicopter to speed them away in time to catch Trammere Rover (or Nigel did anyway).
    The Football show there were on was Under The Moon.
    I’m pretty that and Whistle Test remain the only 2 Tv performances. (though the Dickie Davies Eyes video made it to the Chart Show at least once).

  8. Paul F

    I remember that Chart Show edition! The camera focuses on what appears to be a “Romany bint in a field with her paints” but as “she” looks up you see it’s a Dickie-Davies lookalike.

  9. simon smith

    There was the late night ITV live gig filmed at Manchester Academy in 1990 (may have been shown in 1991) with an appearance by Margi Clarke.With Simon Blackwell`s horrid jumper, and tonsure and facefuzz of a 50 year old man, holding sway the original line up played `Our Tune`, `A Lilac Harry Quinn`, `Nerys Hughes/AIWFCIADPAK`, Dickie Davies`, `No Rugrats` and perhaps `Trumpton Riots` (I`ll have to watch it and check)

  10. Dave F.

    No idea why I would have typed The Tube, knowing full well they didn’t play. (Doh!)

    I guess I’m thinking of the show you mention Simon, but the HMHB Myspace page lists it as a Granada production so it may not have been shown down here in the West country. If that’s the case, I’m not sure how I would have seen it?

    It’s also got a fuller set list (down near the bottom):

    http://www.myspace.com/hmhb

  11. Richard

    This appeared in the Daily Telegraph last year:
    Like Dr Rowan Williams, Half Man Half Biscuit have enriched our culture
    Possibly the only time that comparison has ever been made?

  12. Great work Gary Parkinson for the finest catalogue of HMHB football references I’ve yet seen on Four-Four-Two’s website.

  13. Dave F.

    For those who aren’t on the Yahoo group:
    Irvine Welsh talks about HMHB …and plays JDOG. His bit starts about 00:50.

  14. Great one from Cult Cargo which hasn’t been acknowledged yet.

  15. Why Half Man Half Biscuit are wholly terrific in the Guardian’s Music Blog: “Witty and dry, sardonic yet never cynical, the lyrics of Half Man Half Biscuit are an undiscovered treasure trove. It’s time this great Birkenhead band got their due”

  16. Ian in Colorado

    The Guardian again comes through, this time from a reader at 11:55am –

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/aug/01/ashes-third-test-day-three

  17. Nice page-long interview with Nigel in Word Magazine’s September 2009 issue, in a feature listing the magazine’s “Cult Heroes”. It’s the issue with beardy Robert Wyatt on the front.

  18. Peter Gandy

    Chris,

    I’ve only just noticed the spine of that issue: “There’s a man with a mullet going mad with a mallet in Millets”

  19. I found what must be one of the first ever national press articles about the band in an old NME I picked up on eBay. It’s the one with that photo. And here it is.

  20. PaulLobster

    The Sunday Post dated 14/02/2010 featured an article about the Lakes or wherever, and mentions Ambleside and (David) Wainwrights bitter. Further on in the Oor Wullie weekly, Vicky Leandros gets a mention or two, but they mention Corfu as opposed to Kos?
    A great read that had me chuckling to myself.
    Also has a decent sport section and TV bit which no-doubt had a handfull of other “Celebs” and “A-Lister” thrown in just for good measure.
    I wonder if the editor re-alised what he had put into print.

  21. As a follow-up to the NME article (above), the mighty eBay has now provided me with an issue of Sounds from a few months later (April 1986) which had the band as their colour centre spread, no less. You want to see it? Aw, go on then:

    Full colour spread (now there’s a photo)

    Cleaned-up article scan – you may need to zoom in with your browser (“Hairy Diana” anyone?)

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