One swift glance around the once-palatial Kentish Town Forum could have the less sober in the gathering throng harbouring concerns that they had just slipped effortlessly back into the early 90s. The garish posters adorning the walls advertise forthcoming acts such as Echobelly, Lush and for reasons unfathomable to me, EMF. This is the musical world we all inhabit folks, where our favourites of yesteryear reform to dip into the lucrative financial trough in a bid to top up their pension pots. I wander into the venue just in time to see The Wedding Present shuffle onstage to gaze lovingly at their shoes. Need I say more?
The Wonder Stuff, however, are not making a comeback because they never went away. They are unique in that they have never sold out, probably on account of their refusal to buy in. I have never quite understood why greater respect has not been forthcoming, and they are widely ignored when it comes to deconstructing this period of British musical history. Perhaps the press and public alike never forgave them for stinking up the charts with ‘Dizzy‘. Yet this is a band that has adapted, endured and even had the good grace to take a sabbatical once Britpop came along. Now, unbelievably, The Wonder Stuff are 30.
Miles Hunt takes centre stage looking like a Victorian fop, all baggy white shirt and untamed curly locks. We are eased gently into ‘30 Years In The Bathroom‘ and a collective cheesy grin breaks out throughout the audience. Of course, what else could we possibly start with? Unusually for Hunt, he decides to keep his anecdotes and verbal asides to a minimum, happy in the knowledge that he has three decades of cherished pop gold to plough through and judging by the age of the crowd, he knows that if he drops the pace for one moment, some of us aren’t going to get back up again.
The pace hots up as we speed through ‘Here Comes Everyone‘ and ‘Caught In My Shadow‘ and by now everyone is in full throttle. We haven’t come to spend Friday night looking at the spectacular decor of this wonderful listed building, no, we’re here because we’ve paid the babysitter an extra fiver and said we won’t be back until gone midnight. We’re here to party.
So Miles and his latest band of cohorts rip through the seemingly endless Wonder Stuff playbook, ‘Golden Green‘ is a terrace anthem for country folk, ‘Circlesquare‘ their homage to Madchester and when the keyboard player wanders on to fulfil his three minute contract we all know that ‘The Size Of A Cow‘ is about to be unleashed. Yes, it’s not big, it’s not clever and no one has ever pretended that The Wonder Stuff have progressed the cause of world music but, and this is the important bit, they are fun. With a capital ‘F’.
Of course, being the age we are, there has to be a moment to draw breath but the crescendo of boos which greats the anouncement that “we’re going to play a new song now” is half tongue in cheek but also genuinely heartfelt. Yes, we all know there’s a new album out but quite frankly we can listen to that tomorrow. Miles has seen it all before, this guy has a Masters degree in crowd management and deflects the criticism by challenging “if you’re going to boo then can you at least do it in the key of D“. They launch into ‘For The Broken Hearted‘ as the masses opt to empty their bladders and refill their glasses.
The last 20 minutes is just an onslaught of hit after hit, starting with the savage ‘Don’t Let Me Down Gently‘ and ending six songs later with the beautifully chaotic ‘Ten Trenches Deep‘. Somewhere in between, my larynx has given up the ghost, probably during ‘Unbearable‘ or more likely ‘A Wish Away‘ which takes me back, way back, to 1988 when EMF were yet to be inflicted upon the world. The Wonder Stuff skip off stage like teenagers wanting to devour their first ever rider; quite where they find the energy is beyond me and beyond most of the fifty-something audience who are now bathed in sweat. There are grown men slumped lovingly over one another, beams of light cutting through the air and bouncing off their bald patches, brightening up the world on a dark, cold March evening. This is what The Wonder Stuff create, a joyous and beautiful camaraderie.
The encores play out, the crowd raises itself for one last singalong for ‘It’s Yer Money I’m After Baby‘ and they are gone, no fanfare, no hero worshipping, just each member calmly walking off one by one as the final strains of ‘Good Night Though‘ wash over us.
“I didn’t like you very much when I met you…“. Well sorry Miles, it was love at first sight for me and thirty years on that isn’t about to change. Thank you.
