2020 Charity Shop Purchases 64 - Chumbawamba - Tubthumper
I've seen this on a number of occassions and never thought to pick it up.However I was on a roll so I thought I would give it a listen.
I was a bit apprehensive as I've always considered Tubthumping to be a bit of a novelty song. It reached number 9 in the UK singles chart after being released in August 1997.
Tubthumper was the first album by Chumbawanba to be released on a mainstream label namely EMI and reached number 19 in the UK charts. It sold a staggering 3.2 million in the States. There may well have been more shifted as Alice Nutter gave an interview encouraging folk to steal it from the larger chains.
Not bad for an anarchist and socialist band whose first album from 1986 was called Pictures of Starving Children Sell Records. Their signing to EMI led to Oi Polloi releasing an EP called Bare Faced Hypocrisy Sells Records.
Suddenly they were everywhere and all over the papers particulalry when Danbert Nobacon poured a jug of water of Labour Deputy Leader John Prescott at the BRIT awards. They had changed the words of Tubthumping slightly following Labour's refusal to support the Liverpool Dockers Strike but it still seems strange that they appeared at these awards.
The album doesn't do much for me. and indeed to received mixed reviews. I'm not convinced that it's a keeper. Not because it is the worse CD I've ever bought or even the worst from this haul. I just don't see me listening to it again.
I'll stick with my CD singles of Timebomb and Enough is Enough with Credit to the Nation thanks
Chumbawamba - Drip, Drip, Drip
I'm a big fan of Chumbawamba ever since the Revolution single. Tubthumping is an album that I don't play that often but Tubthumping the song, I love. You should seek out Swinging With Raymond the album that preceded Tubthumping and The Boy Bands Have Won which are both excellent
ReplyDeleteTheir latter records were really folky, especially demonstrating their vocal harmony abilities. They were down to a four-piece by this stage. I think you might like them.
ReplyDeleteI think the highlight of Chumbawamba's career has to be the use of their name in a song in the "Family Guy" spoof of Willy Wonka:
ReplyDelete"Chumba wumba gobbledy goo
Life isn't fair
Its sad but its true..."
Never heard that little bit at the end of Tubthumping. Interesting.
ReplyDelete