Shopping Cart

Quick Search

Newsletter

*PLEASE READ T's&C's
Tubthumper cover image

Tubthumper

Artists: Chumbawamba
Label: EMI
Catalogue Number: 4959392
Our Price: £7.99 (£6.80 exc vat)
Format: CD
More in this Category

Product Description

Rather than opting for the cathartic and visceral approach of fellow agit-prop, anarchist groups such as Crass, Chumbawamba produce cerebral and reflective music on their major label debut TUBTHUMPER. As Gang Of Four's ENTERTAINMENT! was to socialism, TUBTHUMPER is to anarchism. But this isn't the hippie anarcho-ruralism of Gong or sludgy Rage Against The Machine pontification--Chumbawamba knows their theory. TUBTHUMPER mixes textbook anarchism with current musical trends, from jungle and trip-hop to plunderphonics and Britpop.
Throughout this mix of styles, the message is heady. Whether it is union corruption in Liverpool's dockworkers strike ("One-By-One") or anti-Catholic proselytisation ("Mary, Mary"), the message is less bomb-throwing Bakunin vitriol and bilious Goldman tirades, and more academic and syncretic. As such, TUBTHUMPER will probably appeal more to the anorak-wearing student type than to members of Class War. Chumbawamba want to use music as a weapon in the war against Capitalism and could become Greil Marcus's next darlings, but if music is just another fetishised commodity in a spectacular society, it will be a while before TUBTHUMPER foments another May '68. Until it does, though, be content to sit back and listen to some enjoyably catchy and thought-provoking tunes.

Track list

  1. Tubthumping
  2. Small Town
  3. I Want More
  4. Scapegoat
  5. Top Of The World (Ole Ole Ole)
  6. Amnesia
  7. Drip Drip Drip
  8. Big Issue
  9. Good Ship Lifestyle
  10. One By One
  11. Outsider
  12. Creepy Crawling
  13. Mary Mary