Where's The Beach

Where's The Beach were formed in late 1987 in Liverpool after hearing the Justified Ancients of Mu Mu's The Queen and I. Pete and Adam soon enlisted the vocal talent of the diminutive minx Chloe Mac. Following in the footsteps of The Beatles the band played their first Liverpool gig in the (then squatted, now Wine Bar) Jacoranda Club on 3rd February 1989. The audience included a large percentage of dogs on bits of string but as this was the first night of squatting there was very little dog poo on the floor. The gig was a total classic although not in the musical sense. (Small feedback problem!) The band got their first big break when Fenny from Radio Lancashire's seminal On The Wire radio show played not one but all the tracks from the bands first porta-studio demo. Luckily, Alison Martin, Scam Records supremo, heard the tracks and got the band to supply two songs for the well respected Freak Beats compilation. This LP also included The Suns of Arqa, Mighty Force and 808 State . Where's The Beach were deemed to be so good (or perhaps just cheap) that they were asked to record two numbers. In order to fool a discerning public who would otherwise think that the album was nothing more than a thinly veiled vehicle to shovel out Where's The Beach material, one of the songs, Deliciously Deranged was attributed to a different (stoopid) name, The Elliptical Trampolines, or the Convoluted Pullovers as John Peel called them. The bands looked destined for the big time after having their other Freak Beats track, Tripping The LUV Fantastic, broadcast on daytime Radio Ones' Newsbeat program. Quite literally, a short while later, Peelie got in touch and booked them for a first session. There was absolute panic in the Beach Camp as the band only had three songs instead of the usual Peel quota of four. They were going to record a version of the Cabaret Voltaire classic Nag Nag Nag but in the end the twit Dale Griffin (ex-Mott The Hoople drummer and professional saddo) cut the session short. The band recorded three tracks in the studio where Bing Crosby made his last recording. They did the two songs from Freak Beats and a version of their soon-to-be first single Suakin (pronounced Sue-R-Kin). Peelie absolutely loved the session and played it three times once being in his best-of-the-year round-up in December. (Many people say that WTB never regained the raw energy that was captured on that session - it was mainly due to the equipment not being very good and slack midi timings caused by connecting things up incorrectly. Technology is not always a good thing! Check out Tripping The LUV Fantastic on the New Season Compilation CD on Strange Fruit Records.)