THE PLEASUREHEADS

"Falling Man"/"(Don't) Fake It"

(Molesworth Records HUNTS 2)

coverpage

introduction

The Blue Mist

Darkness At Noon

The Pleasureheads

Nutmeg

Flowershop

The Charlottes

The Nightjars

 80's Cambs rock

(c) Andrew Clifton 2000-1
"A video was being made and The Pleasureheads made a corny entrance. Dean Nicholls was on drums and Pete Elderkin on vocals (although they swapped jobs from time to time), and Mark Randall played guitar along with Andrew Donovan (rhythm) and Pete Herron (bass). They sound like a funny version of Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds. There is a lot of the currently trendy southern states gothic in their set which includes..."Swamp" which builds up menacingly to a long silence followed by Dean and Mark suddenly screaming and diving into the audience. Both group and audience enjoyed going over the top in front of the video camera, the guitarists running through their heavy metal poses and a row of girls screaming in mock adulation at the front.

"Although the emphasis of their performance is on fun and humour, this is not to say that the 'heads are stupid. They take their music seriously and it needs considerable planning and self-control to keep a balance and avoid slipping into boring silliness. The Pleasureheads have built up a rapport with their fans by dressing up differently for each gig. At The Peacock they wore Pleasurehead T-shirts bearing gormless cartoon faces...At the Stafford Hall gig they confused us all by donning dinner jackets, but at the Glasshouse they and their friends wore Roman togas (well, sheets). This they performed to the hilt as a farewell gig, but invited us to see a new cowboy band at Hickory's later in the week. Needless to say, The Pleasureheads and their fans turned up suitably attired."


Andy Donovan's Pleasurehead logo

I wrote the above in Blue Suede News in 1985 and I still haven't seen a more entertaining live band than the Pleasureheads (named from the Birthday Party song "Pleasureheads Must Burn"). After demoing them at Metronome, the band recorded three songs at Surrey University's studio with Jim Abbiss. Released as a double A-sided 7", "Falling Man" was NME Single Of The Week and, topping several other favourable reviews of "(Don't) Fake It", was praise from Mark E Smith of The Fall in Record Mirror. Networked through Rough Trade/Cartel by Backs Records, who have been my distributor ever since, the first pressing sold out rapidly. I believe the second pressing had red and yellow labels instead of purple and green, and that on the cover the head logo had green cheeks - but this sold so fast I never saw one! On the Sunday after its release, The Pleasureheads stood in for The Bible (whose rhythm section was stranded in Italy, in The Roaring Boys) at a Key Theatre Glasshouse lunchtime concert, then blew aside headliners Curiosity Killed The Cat at a Peterborough rock festival in the afternoon. They were soon signed by Red Rhino Records, the top provincial indie of the time, to its Ediesta label. Consequently the third recording, "Fenland Blues", remained unreleased although the tape became a firm favourite on BBC Radio Cambridgeshire's Rock Show.

What happened next to The Pleasureheads? Continue to find out.