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| © copyright 2004 |
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 | Goosebump
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Goosebump began in 1993. With Barry Kinder (Vocals), Miles Bould (Drums), Scott Firth (Bass & FX) and Neil Black (Electric Violin).
The concept behind the band was………..well, there wasn’t one. Scott and Miles had been friends for a long time and had played together a lot over the years. They had already recorded a jazz-fusion album and were interested in doing something that represented their eclectic tastes. They dug bands such as Fishbone and Rage Against the Machine, along with Hip Hop and mad jazz-rock-fusion maestro Frank Zappa. Neil Black was somebody they had both recorded with on other projects, so when they discussed putting something together they thought of Neil on violin as an element to weird everything out. The grooves for tracks Goodbye, Fear and Loathing, Dressed in Black, Forty Freaky Frogs and Get off the Phone were hammered out in Miles’ kitchen over the next few months. Once they had some tracks together, they began to think about getting a vocalist. Naturally, they chose a drummer?? and someone who had never sung up front before, Barry Kinder. Miles and Barry were good mates and had toured and played on the same sessions, with Barry on drums and Miles on Percussion. Miles had thought Barry would make a great front man because of his weird St. Louis sense of humour and his swamp funk tendencies. “Where's my moonshine an ‘gator stew?” Barry was originally from St Louis USA, and had come over to the UK to work as a drum tech on a gig that Miles was on. An accomplished drummer himself, he later landed the gig himself. | ||||||||||||||||
 | Barry had already shown that he was fantastic at coming up with lines and hooks when he and Miles had been playing around in the studio, so Miles played Barry the tracks the band had written so far and asked him if wanted to come up with something for them. He was an absolute natural. On the first day of rehearsal he had the other guys in stitches with his lyrics and his antics; he accidentally trashed the room in his excitement. His vocal style went from, yodelling, hillbilly, rapp to a screaming madman, with a touch of “old crooner” thrown in for good measure. This with Scott’s ability to make the bass sound like a jet aeroplane about to take off, Neil’s general weirdness (think Peter Cushing’s much younger brother in looks and general mood) and fantastic 5 string electric violin and Miles’ Hip Hop drumming style, made Goosebump into a very original and exciting live band. Their first gig had the other bands on the bill staring with confusion as to how a four-piece band with no electric guitar could sound quite so huge and also have the punters wondering what the hell the nutter on the mic was gonna do next?
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The band gigged around and just played for the hell of it. Having no manager and not even thinking about record deals and the like, life was bliss.
Enter manager no.1 ……no, skip this bit……Enter manager no.4. Won’t mention names, cause he was crap, but he did manage to secure a publishing deal with Warner Chappell for the band. By this time the band had been together for 3 years and had recorded an E.P Puckering Starfish; featuring tracks Goodbye, Get off the Phone, Forty Freaky Frogs and Clock and recorded 2 videos on a small budget with an expensive look and lots of great ideas. Just as they signed the publishing deal, Scott had been offered another gig which he couldn’t refuse, so he went off to do that and the band decided to carry on with Yolanda Charles on Bass. As Miles and Yo were partners and had worked together before, she stepped into the bass gig and the band was able to carry on. Frustratingly, the publishing deal led to nowhere as the person who signed them left literally as the ink dried on the contract. The manager lost interest as his share of the advance gained interest; this had to lead to his swift exit. For the next year the band continued gigging and recording; manager-less again. They then snared a great management team who were exactly the right guys the band had needed all along…..Way too late as it turned out. The band had been carrying on, but it began to stop being fun as they were inevitably told by “business” to “write that smash hit single”, Well the band had never been about that and after a disastrous trip to America, Goosebump split up. | |
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