Another Britpop band who I discovered through a tape that was given away with an issue of Smash Hits. I’ve always said that if Britpop didn’t reach the mainstream then I may have never discovered the brilliance of other less commercial types of indie music… if only it would happen now then the kids of today wouldn’t be growing up ignorant and accepting any old shite that’s fed to them. I was so lucky to have grown up then and not now. It was the hugely infectious ‘She Said’ that introduced me to the Longpigs, and it would be a couple of years or so before I heard the stunning ‘On And On’ on a CD compilation called ‘Crush’, the song which turned me into a fan. I even thought some of their 1999 album ‘Mobile Home’ was pretty damn good as well, and featured a couple of great singles. The Sheffield-based Longpigs rose to fame on the fringe of Britpop in the 1990s, and featured Crispin Hunt (vocals), Richard Hawley (guitar), Simon Stafford (bass guitar) and former Cabaret Voltaire member Dee Boyle (drums) who was replaced by Andy Cook (drums) on their second album. They split in 2000 following the commercial failure of their second album and the closure of their label Mother Records. Hawley went on to play with Pulp before enjoying a successful solo career, while Hunt has worked as a songwriter and/or record producer for Ellie Goulding, Jake Bugg, Penguin Prison, Midnight Lion, Florence and The Machine, Newton Faulkner, Cee-Lo Green, Natalie Imbruglia, Gabriella Cilmi, Lisa Mitchell, Lissie, Fighting with Wire, Richard Walters, Josephine Oniyama, Clare Maguire, Liam Frost, Ron Sexsmith, Ej, Mark Owen, Kate Walsh, and Max Tuohy.
