Toad the Wet Sprocket (English band)
| Toad the Wet Sprocket | |
|---|---|
| General information | |
| origin | Bedford , England |
| Genre (s) | New wave of British heavy metal , rock , blues rock |
| founding | Mid 1970s |
| resolution | 1982 or later |
| Last occupation | |
| Pete Austin | |
| Martin "Witik" Wightwick | |
| John Murphy | |
Electric guitar |
Mark "Curly" Rideaut |
| Mike Mustofa | |
| former members | |
| Nick Rideaut aka Pip Domino | |
Toad the Wet Sprocket was an English new wave of British heavy metal and rock band from Bedford that was formed in the mid-1970s and disbanded around 1982.
history
The band was formed in the mid-1970s, taking their name from a Monty Python sketch. The line-up consisted of singer Mike Mustofa, guitarist Mark “Curly” Rideaut, bassist Pete Austin and drummer Martin “Witik” Wightwick. In 1979, the band's own label Sprockets Records released the single Pete's Punk Song with Feel It as the B-side , which received little public attention and accordingly sold poorly. On the A side, Mark's brother Nick Rideaut - known there under the name Pip Domino - can be heard playing the piano . Until the beginning of 1981 the band held various concerts and performed with Nutz , Budgie , Samson , Vardis , Girl , Angel Witch and Iron Maiden , among others . 1981 followed, again with their own label, the next single Reaching for the Sky with the B-side One Glass of Whiskey . In February 1981 the band was also represented with the song Blues in A on the sampler Metal for Muthas . On June 27, the band was invited to the Friday Rock Show , where they played the songs Just Another Game , Rock and Roll Runner , One Glass of Whiskey and Big Deal . After the performance, the band went on tour in the months that followed, performing with Bleak House , Clientele and High Treason , which helped them increase their popularity. Then the band was listed in the Kerrang in the Armed and Ready category . In 1982 the band placed on the sampler Lend an Ear 1992? from Vroom Records the song Charlie . Around the same year the band split up.
style
According to Malc Macmillan in The NWOBHM Encyclopedia , the band initially played a kind of mixture of metal , punk and " pub rock" before turning to the typical sounds of NWoBHM. The A-side of the first single is a bizarre and confusing mix of traditional rock with piano sounds. Feel It is even more cheesy and is already tending towards easy listening . The second single offers a medium-paced mix of metal and rock, reminiscent of bands like Sledgehammer , Nightime Flyer and Chainsaw from Coventry . Blues in A from the sampler Metal for Muthas is pointless, loose and slippery rock. He described Big Deal from the Friday Rock Show as high-energy, while Just Another Game and One Glass of Whiskey were interchangeable and slow and Rock and Roll Runner was medium-paced.
Eduardo Rivadavia from Allmusic had similar assessments . The first single offers a mixture of “pub rock” and lounge music , while the second single fits better into the NWoBHM. With Blues in A he noticed a strong blues influence .
Jürgen Hegewald described the theme song of Reaching for the Sky as driving, powerful British heavy metal in the book NWoBHM New Wave of British Heavy Metal The glory Days , written by the Iron Pages Radaktion . Otherwise one tends towards blues rock in other songs .
Also in The International Encyclopedia of Hard Rock and Heavy Metal , the group's music was described as very blues-heavy metal.
Discography
- 1979: Pete's Punk Song (single, Sprockets Records)
- 1980: Reaching for the Sky (single, Sprockets Records)
Individual evidence
- ^ A b Eduardo Rivadavia: Toad the Wet Sprocket. Allmusic , accessed November 8, 2018 .
- ↑ Biography. rockdetector.com, archived from the original on October 9, 2016 ; accessed on November 8, 2018 .
- ↑ a b Malc Macmillan: The NWOBHM Encyclopedia . IP Verlag Jeske / Mader GbR, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-931624-16-3 , p. 623 f .
- ^ Matthias Mader, Otger Jeske, Manfred Kerschke: NWoBHM New Wave of British Heavy Metal The glory Days . Iron Pages, Berlin 1995, p. 146 f .
- ↑ Tony Jasper, Derek Oliver: The International Encyclopedia of Hard Rock and Heavy Metal . Facts on File Inc., New York 1983, ISBN 0-8160-1100-1 , pp. 352 .