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Bum! is a pop/punk band from South London, England. They formed in
the late 1980s and featured a varying line-up until they eventually
went their separate ways in the mid 90's
From their official
online profile:
"BUM! started as an idea Dave Ramwell and Graeme
Martin had in the late eighties to be a two piece "Pet Shop Boys
with attitude" which would go under the moniker 'THE BUM BOYS'.
They had hoped to give it that Electro-Punk feel, but the vibe they
were into at the time was a mish-mash of Buzzcocks, Boys Wonder,
bovva boots, braces, and a sense of Britishness. With this in mind,
their brief foray into the world of camp euro-pop mutated into the
blue-print for BUM! They eagerly recruited Marcus Boyd having been
impressed with his monkeyboy antics in the very stylish band
'Lunatic Soup'. With him he bought bass-boy supremo Mick Carroll
and a combination of NME ads and networking at gigs brought them
Stuart Soulsby on drums. In their early days the songs were crude
but required four things: 1. Quirky lyrics from Marcus. 2. Ultra
fast rhythm section. 3. Deconstructed lead guitar lines. 4. Toy
town piano and organ sounds. The band got very tight and gained a
reputation as musical mavericks peddling frantic three minute pop
tunes played in two with a sense of humour at it's core. This was a
time when shoe-gazing was all the thing and boys and girls were
trying hard to pout and affect disaffection. You can imagine how
well this bunch of spotty 'erberts went down. Eventually the band
came to the attention of Dave Goodman who produced their epic 'The
Valerie Brown EP', which earnt high praise in certain quarters and
picked up some good radio airplay. The band lasted for a couple of
years in its original line up before they all went their own
seperate ways. Stuart to old punkers 'Chelsea'. Mick into
occasional collaborations with the likes of 'The Godfathers'. Dave
to live in Thailand. Graeme to write and perform solo/accoustically
and Marcus to addle his brain down in Bristol on a strict diet of
class 'A's and scrumpy. Let us not forget Steve Humphreys who was
the non-playing member of the band. he put his time into organising
recordings, gigs, promos
etc."