NEW MODEL ARMY and some stuff from my youth...

Get into this band. Now...

Utterly 'genre'-less stuff and HONEST music untouched by fashion and trends.

I first heard of them through my big sisters ex-boyfriend in 1989. Thinking back I kind of worshipped him at the time (it turned out years later that he was a violent idiot as well as a total poser, nevermind) as he was several years older than me, had his finger to the pulse of 'alternative music' and I was a 14 year old kid weened on Heavy Metal and was just developing a bigger sense of what was worthwhile music, the stuff he was listening to seemed 'grown up' and sophisticated (HA!), it fascinated me. He also introduced me to stuff like Killing Joke, The Cure, Joy Division, Sisters Of Mercy, The Smiths and tons more...but that's another story.

Anyways, he copied me 'Ghost of Cain' and 'Thunder and Consolation' and I pretty much wore out the tape. I shared New Model Army with friends at the time, my band-mates in Death Metal band 'Fratricide' (we were very 'special', only the drummer Gavin could really play well. We just used to jam a muted E chord whilst Rod and myself would grunt over the top. Sounded great to us though) and they loved it too. We used to have NMA listening sessions over bags of Chips and cans of coke (what do you expect? We were 14!). We quickly snapped up the rest of the discography including the (then) latest album 'Impurity'. Sadly over the exciting flourish of early 90's music (Black/Death Metal, Nirvana, Lo-fi, taping John Peel and listening to every track for that golden nugget) I somehow lost touch with the band.

Over the last 7 years or so, being with the same woman and marrying said soul mate, I've found a lot of time to relax and look back on the stuff I used to listen to and New Model Army have been the latest bit of buried treasure I've re-discovered. I've been carefully picking my way through their back catalogue and to my surprise they've remained pretty much untouched musically. Even their new stuff is great. I picked up the latest album 'Today Is A Good Day' and apart from the slightly clumsy proto-metal chugging on the title track, it's a great album.

I'm now fully booked in to see them live here in Bristol next month, and I'm fully expecting my eyes to be moist when they wheel out the old tracks.

So, here's to you New Model Army...really good to hear you again, I've missed ya. Salute!