Part One

I Was A Teenage Bride Of The Replicants!

by Alice Caitlin Morray

HOBO PRIESTS & BIRTHDAY CANDLES

Curiouser and curiouser. Look what the Cheshire Cat just dragged in. It seems that my favourite freakshow troubadours have finally clicked their ruby heels together and come tumbling back from whichever Madhatter dimension they've been hiding out in for the past three winters. It's hard to describe just how wonderful it is to have Mister Vickers and his Hole In The Head Gang back in my life, haunting me into wakefulness with their everyday tales of trashcan glamour; fantastical imaginings from the netherworld; a musical gumbo of fractured lovesongs for all those dislocated souls among us: liquor-pickled scholars, dignified hookers, broken-hearted delinquents, sentimental lifers, hobo priests.

Welcome home, boys! (I think Scarecrow missed you most of all.)

I'm sure I wasn't alone in wondering whatever had happened to Dawn Of The Replicants after the promotional whirligig of their second eastwest album (1999's synapse-scorching 'Wrong Town, Wrong Planet, Three Hours Late') had finally zuzzed to a halt. What fiendish loverats those boys had turned out to be: exploding into my life like sexed-up Terminators, black orchids clenched in their chrome-capped teeth, dancing a feisty tarantella across the bedroom floor, and then disappearing just as quickly into the ether, no forwarding address, no single red rose left wilting on the pillow, just another puzzling absence in my life. Perhaps they'd burned too brightly, like one of Dr Nobel's special birthday candles, its sizzling wick glowing amber in the night and, then, KABOOMBAH!

EAT MY BLURB!

"A most unlikely, yet brilliantly exhilarating rock band" (The Independent)

"A cultural revelation. No less" (Time Out)

"In these lean times, it's imperative that stuff like this survives"
(Q Magazine)

"Leaves you panting for more, breathless that talent like this can still emerge at the end of the nineties" (Melody Maker)

"The Replicants are unique and enthralling" (Mojo)

"Another jumbled collection of richly-sourced mini-masterpieces"
(Sunday Times)

"Fast becoming indispensable British eccentrics" (NME)

"Will challenge every notion you ever held about pop music" (Times Metro)

"Their music can be quite ridiculously brilliant and catchy"
(Sunday Telegraph)

"Full of unusual angles and odd ideas to conjure with, this is still an album with a hot rock 'n' roll heart" (The Times)

"Beneath student-friendly wilful weirdness, there's many a pop nugget"
(SKY Magazine)

"Head-spinning left-field rock you can hum in the shower" (The List)

"Twisted psychedelic rock and Pavement style eccentricity... complete with doolally lyrics" (FHM)

"No matter what town, planet or time they arrive at, the Replicants have created an instant classic" (Flipside)

A FIRE IN THE LOFT
(Step Right Up 'zine, issue 2)

PAUL VICKERS: I've got a bit of a problem with fire. Just a mild fascination. Stuff like burning my feet - I do that quite often, just to see how long I can take the heat. It's not even entertainment, it's just a habit. I once started a fire in the loft. We had a huge snowman that was made out of polystyrene that we used to bring out at Christmas. Me and my brother decided it'd be a magic idea if the snowman started smoking a fag. We knew we might be in trouble, so we'd already prepared buckets of water. The fire got quite bad but we managed to put it out. My grandma was very good about it actually 'cause we were staying with her at the time. She didn't even tell my Mum.

THE BLAZING DERISION OF BRIAN MOLKO
It was a strange and wonderful tale, which touched the hearts of many: "Four Farmers and a Freak" straight outtta Galashiels (wherever in Hell that was) who had somehow gotten themselves signed to a Warner Bros offshoot purely on the strength of one solitary no-budget, no-fidelity vinyl ep, which they'd released themselves on some fly-by-night bedroom label. (Ah, bless!) The rapscallions hadn't even played a gig yet and Bugs Bunny was already waving his golden chequebook under their noses. (Mick Hucknall never had it this good.)

Nobody could accuse these New Cads on the Block of coasting along on their prettyboy looks (did you ever SEE those Press Pics?). One thing's for sure, though - they certainly weren't afraid to roll up their shirt-sleeves and get a little honest-to-goodness muck under their fingernails. It was incredible what DOTR managed to produce in the space of two years: six EPs, two albums, three multi-format singles, two 10" vinyls, three Peel sessions and a Fierce Panda split single (with The Inner Sleeve). That's over forty-five songs! And, if you ever take the time to go back and listen through them you'll be amazed by the quality of songwriting the band sustained throughout.

Of course, a splash like that is always sure to send ripples through the biz, and DOTR were like a Mega-Tsunami crashing into the shoreline (if you don't mind me being all melodramatical). Soon enough they were garnering plaudits aplenty from far and wide: the "Best New Band Of '97" awarded by 'The Times'; a Mark Radcliffe Single of the Week (for the chart-bothering 'Candlefire'); the David Holmes / Tim Goldsworthy remix of 'Skullcrusher' (a raging dancefloor anthem for several weeks in '98); four Singles of the Week in NME and Melody Maker.

But the band were, perhaps, happiest when basking in the blazing derision of Brian Molko and Chris Moyles (who awarded 'The Diesel Hands EP' Dumpster Of The Week in Melody Maker. Now there's a stamp of quality you can trust!)

MARCEL MARCEAU
(The original Sin 'zine, issue 20)

DIDIER BECU: The band are using weird toys on stage. Why?

ROGER SIMIAN: Paul Vickers messes about with a tone generator and sometimes car horns or sirens. I guess he just likes playing with toys and making loud noises.

DIDIER BECU: Which known person may immediately join the band?

ROGER SIMIAN: Marianne Faithfull would bring a bit of rough glamour to the proceedings.

DIDIER BECU: And with whom would it be a nightmare?

ROGER SIMIAN: Marcel Marceau.

Part Two