12 Overlooked Pieces of Awesome is an article series where each month Flint hopelessly rambles about an album in his collection that he dearly loves, even when they have their flaws. Each of the albums chosen tends to be usually overlooked, or forgotten, in one way or another and thus this article series aims to give an alternative view on said albums, or simply just bring something a bit less known to the spotlight.

Chumbawamba – Anarchy (1994)

The problem with trying to be edgily self-destructive is that you end up throwing away your audience before they even had the chance to get to know you. Publicity stunt -like take-thats against everything and everyone, putting a just-born baby on the cover of your album, trying to subvert and bend the rules of promotion in every way possible… all characteristic things that while give you a certain personality, also brush off away people. The problem with Chumbawamba has always been that they broke into general consciousness once and once only with an almost annoyingly big way – “Tubthumping” was a gigantic hit much thanks to its insanely catchy chorus and simple lyrics about pub culture, and it’s one of the most love-it-or-hate-it kind of one-hit wonders there is. The band had already been active before that for quite a while and after Tubthumping the band pretty much decided to first rebel (2000’s WYSIWYG that devoted an entire album on taking the piss, parodying, attacking and at the same time cheekingly embracing the pop consumerist culture) and then just fade away doing their own thing for their own fun and for fans’ sake (the string of more folk-styled albums released up to this very day). And even those who do get the weird, random decision to investigate the band’s works outside Tubthumping and its parent album Tubthumper will end up hitting certain walls that make it very hard to go on further.

Like that baby cover.

1994’s Anarchy, the subject of our discussion today, is the one with the infamous baby cover. If it wasn’t for that and the band’s infamous one-hit-wonder/”those damn bastards who brought us that pub song” reputation, I’d expect it to be viewed as one of the 90’s great cult classics. It’s probably the most deliciously catchy pop album with a vicious tongue stuck permanently in its cheek that the 90’s produced.

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It kinda pains me when people brush off Chumbawamba solely based on Tubthumping. It’s not because I love the song myself (which I do – and the album it’s in as well), but because people who do so are brushing off a band with a varied output and a completely different style these days based on their lucky off-shoot pop hit from long ago.

It’s not to say though that they’re an easy band to like because, well, all the sloganising political bravado can get silly at times and their discography varies not only in style but in quality – usually even singular albums aren’t entirely free of massive quality changes. But there is a great group there with fantastic vocal hooks and a marvelous pop sensibility.

In the early 00’s the band’s latest stylistic incarnation began and has kept going to this day. It’s the band’s folk music phase, studying old traditional English folk songs and crafting their own. They’ve released a string of albums with each offering a different take on folk music – Un is acoustic-guitar driven pop with a huge mix of samples from different parts of the world thrown in, A Singsong and a Scrap went fully acoustic and at times even a cappella and the band also saw fit to re-release English Rebel Songs 1381-1984, an a cappella album full of covers of traditional songs. I haven’t heard it myself, but the new The Boy Bands Have Won seems to continue in the same acoustic vein.

We are here to talk about 2002’s Readymades however. It’s the album that began their folk incursion and it’s also the one that gives the most unique take on it. If I recall correctly, the band set on create modern versions of old songs – not covers, but songs made in the latest technology and genre style on subjects familiar to both new and old songs that people pass on to each other – modern folk songs. It’s not acoustic, it’s electronic.

It’s a jumble of words, a background tale that might not hear much or even be true. That doesn’t make Readymades’ intriguing mixture of dance and hiphop beats, electronic loops and fragile vocals any less… intriguing. (more…)