Chumbawamba – Anarchy

Chumbawamba certainly managed to polarise opinion throughout their long and some would say not so distinguished career. They went through a lot of musical and personnel changes from punk to dance to folk with lots of other influences in between. They seemed to support a myriad of causes mostly anti-establishment and irreverent and some that bordered on the disgraceful.I thought they were great but could understand those of a different opinion. The anti-chumbawamba ep is a testimony to the feeling at the time of their massive selling tubthumping/tubthumper single/album being a sell-out to the establishment as the pounds and dollars rolled in .I remember being at a low key gig in Camberley when a Rolls Royce pulled up and out stepped Jonathan KIng who apparently was seeking to become their manager at the time Tubthumping was bubbling under and he had come along to presumably see what he might be letting himself in for. Another gig I went to at the old airport in Reim Munich saw them perform their usual eclectic mix of songs that I think was the reason I liked them so much rather than the more extreme left wing views that they were associated with. On the way home I got breathalysed by some gun toting german police - negative fortunately. I spent a long time trying to collect all of their releases including odd songs on odd compilation lp's and cd's. The fact that they frequently begged borrowed and stole samples from other bands culminating in the withdrawn version of Schhh which eventually emerged under the counter as the Jesus H Christ lp only made being a fan more enjoyable. For those wanting to make a start in learning to appreciate the band I would plump for the Anarchy album followed by Swinging with Raymond. Schh, Tubthumper and What You See is What You Get (WYSIWYG) are also well worth a spin.The last few albums are more folk orientated but no less enjoyable for that. Don't listen to any negative publicity about the band - if you dip your toe in you will find a rich mix of punk dance and folk influenced music that is never boring although you might stub that toe on a few occasions. I constantly find myself humming that 'On Ebay' song - give it a whirl on youtube and tell me that I'm mad.

Listed on the top 30 controversial album covers

This one doesn’t need any explanation as to why it caused problems. The anti-establishment rockers, whose guitarist Danbert Nobacon very famously drenched Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott at the 1998 Brit Awards, actually intended to cause outrage with this sleeve. Many stores refused to stock it and others covered it with a plain wrapper.