Despite both hailing from t'South, both STUFFY/ THE FUSES and THE SECRET HAIRDRESSER deserves their 'honourary Yorkshire(wo)man' status with Wrath! thanks to the ceaseless invention of their skwehiff pop genius.
STUFFY/ THE FUSES are led by that credible rarity: a singing drummer. But don't let that put you off, because the infamous Mr.Stuffy is quite a character. Not only does he moonlight impressively in Graham Coxon's band, but he steps in with The Cardiacs and also finds time to help pen unlikely stunners like "Sir Wants Sex". Produced with his usual near-the-knuckle excitement by Steve Albini, this malignant, catchy and quirkily beefy slice of classroom intrigue opens with a whirlwind of drums before ushering in Pete Townshend-style pyrotechnics and stabs of wicked brass from the Scaramanga Stax. It sure as hell knocks The Police's "Don't Stand So Close To Me" into a cocked hat in terms of 'Lolita'-style deviancy an' all. So there.
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Thus, it's a tribute to THE SECRET HAIRDRESSER'S strength in depth that their "Copier" is by no means xeroxed into submission as a result. Indeed, this boy-girl combo from Bury St.Edmonds are anything but disgraced in this company. Theirs is a nag-o-thon of a pop tune with big, brash guitar chords and ridiculously winsome "la la la"s vying for attention before the band spark up the curling tongs and unleash a tasty maelstrom of a crescendo as they treat you to a permanent wave.
Scorching stuff, in more ways than one.
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