Watching The Chart Show’s Indie Chart and four young women are a top ten staple with their single Xx Sex/Rules and Regulations in 1986. They have multi coloured hair and clothes and who you would have to say were, at that point, not the most musically proficient. They had bought a distortion pedal and had become the magnificently named We’ve Got a Fuzzbox and We’re Gonna Use it.
They followed it up with Love Is The Slug which went Top 40 and with John Peel and Janice Long championing them and an appearance on the Old Grey Whistle Test with a violin that sounds as if they are strangling a cat. They had something, and you would not say that they were not entertaining which we all forget, myself included, is what music is meant to be about.
Bostin’ (seemingly means very good in Birmingham) Steve Austin is twelve tracks, eleven originals and a rousing cover of Spirit in the Sky.
Each track has its merits with distortion pedal and pounding drums the main staple and the odd saxophone thrown in for good measure.
They all singalong in harmony for the excellent What’s the Point and Love is the Slug.
Hollow Girl highlighted lead singer, Vix, voice and showed they could do an atmospheric song if they needed to, it’s a nice contrast to the rest of the album.
They returned as just Fuzzbox and as polished pop stars a couple of years later but smoothing out the rough edges they had sadly lost something.
7.5/10
GIVE IT A STREAM: Rules and Regulations