Dubstar weekend: Self Same Thing

From the until-now-last-album, Self Same Thing:



[Buy: the Self-Same Thing]

[Part of Dubstar weekend]

Dubstar weekend: Not So Manic Now & Anywhere

Off German TV in 1996:



[Buy: Not So Manic Now]

[Part of Dubstar weekend]

Dubstar weekend: No More Talk

Although their chart career probably wasn't quite as stellar as EMI would have liked, Dubstar did manage to notch up an agreeable number of Top Of The Pops performances. Look! Look! Here's them doing No More Talk:



(When I watched this, it was offering me Julie Andrews tickets to buy; I can't decide if this was a genius piece of targeted marketing or totally broken.)

[Buy No More Talk]

[Part of the Dubstar weekend]

Dubstar weekend: I Will Be Your Girlfriend

"and now, you'll have to tell your wife" - mad, swirling, staring eyed and perfect:



[Buy: Amazon want a pricey three quid for a vocal remix]

[Part of Dubstar weekend]

Embed and breakfast man: Dubstar

I can't believe there hasn't been a Dubstar weekend already. Perhaps I've just been waiting for an excuse. And the release of I'm In Love With A German Filmstar in a couple of weeks is excuse enough, don't you think?

They started life as The Joans, a boy-boy two-then-three piece which made the big change when one member went off to build a career with British Airways. (That might have seemed a smart move at the time.) Sarah Blackwood was drafted in by Steve Hillier and Chris Wilkie to make up the numbers. A bit of name changing, a deal with Food Records, and before you knew it they were all over the radio. They were helped by disc jockeys not listening too closely to the words of their songs, and assuming Not So Manic Now was a jolly, Christmassy tune.

They did decide to try an actual happy song, managing to release it - Cathedral Park - on the Monday after a drunk guy crashed the car with Princess Diana in it.

There were three albums, and then a decade silence - until now. Sarah Blackwood has been off doing interesting things with Client (and, as a solo extension in the form of Client B), so there's been plenty of stuff to keep us going. But new Dubstar? That feels special.

Let's start with the biggest hit - Stars, which took a rerelease to get to number 15. Here, it's live at Glastonbury 1997:



Buy Dubstar
Disgraceful | Disgraceful mp3
Goodbye | Goodbye mp3
Make It Better | Make It Better mp3

Dubstar anywhere
Official site
Dubstar on Facebook
Dubstar on Last FM
Dubstar on Spotify

More...
Dubstar across the weekend
I Will Be Your Girlfriend
No More Talk on Top Of The Pops
Not So Manic Now & Anywhere
Self Same Thing

Dubstar: This is the sort of thing that gets me over-excited

You might not have had much cause to visit the Dubstar website of late. But perhaps you should.

For right now, there's a gorgeous black and white photo of the band, and the words "I'm In Love With A German Filmstar 12.04.10".

Skreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeecccch!

TAM Commandments: 7. Love's good - but not as good as wanking

No, we're not plumping for The Divynils, or Teenage Kicks and not even She Bop. Instead, one of the the most effective couplets about onanism to have appeared on a lyric sheet: Billy Bragg's "with my own hands/when I make love to your memory..." from St Swithin's Day. It kind of disproves the These Animal Men point, of course. This is Dubstar, covering the song in a Germany at the New Pop Festival in 1996:



[Part of TAM commandments weekend]