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These Animal Men Setlist
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S*M*A*S*H
photo: Jeff Pitcher
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Wish we could have flown to London to see the show.
For more information, check out my interview with Ed from January 2015 and follow the band on FB and for archival purposes, see smash.weheartmusic.com.
Photographs courtesy of Jeff Pitcher.
Here is how they described the Flawed Is Beautiful documentary:
Flawed Is Beautiful is a film about two bands - These Animal Men and S*M*A*S*H - who formed a scene swiftly dubbed by the press as the New Wave Of New Wave - the magnesium flash that, for better or worse, lit the way for Britpop.
Flawed Is Beautiful is also a story of media complicity and career hari kiri. It is about bold ideas, insatiable appetites and international travel. Cheap drugs and pre-destined failure. It is also about the British music industry spinning towards its final years of economic excess and Thatcher’s children biting back. It is about tight T-shirts, eyeliner and what happens when your fifteen minutes of fame runs out. It is a cautionary tale from which no-one learned any lessons.
Like all the best music documentaries, Flawed Is Beautiful is about heroic failure. These Animal Men and S*M*A*S*H didn't have the right accents or connections. But they had the belief and they looked fantastic. They took their moment and made the most of it. And they changed people's lives in small towns out in the provinces, where the big bands didn't ever come to town and where their songs of aspiration and indulgence (TAM) and smalltown rage (S*M*A*S*H) inspired a whole generation of kids.
People always say about the Velvet Underground that everyone who saw them went on to start a band. In the case of These Animal Men and S*M*A*S*H that might actually be true.....
If you live in Manchester, head over to the FabCafe at 2:30pm to see the film on September 19th.
Flawed Is Beautiful is also a story of media complicity and career hari kiri. It is about bold ideas, insatiable appetites and international travel. Cheap drugs and pre-destined failure. It is also about the British music industry spinning towards its final years of economic excess and Thatcher’s children biting back. It is about tight T-shirts, eyeliner and what happens when your fifteen minutes of fame runs out. It is a cautionary tale from which no-one learned any lessons.
Like all the best music documentaries, Flawed Is Beautiful is about heroic failure. These Animal Men and S*M*A*S*H didn't have the right accents or connections. But they had the belief and they looked fantastic. They took their moment and made the most of it. And they changed people's lives in small towns out in the provinces, where the big bands didn't ever come to town and where their songs of aspiration and indulgence (TAM) and smalltown rage (S*M*A*S*H) inspired a whole generation of kids.
People always say about the Velvet Underground that everyone who saw them went on to start a band. In the case of These Animal Men and S*M*A*S*H that might actually be true.....
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These Animal Men at Heaven, London (11 September 2015) photo: Jeff Pitcher
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