Artists:Things In Herds

Things In Herds

"We have been recording albums for several years. And then a couple more years. The first one was called 'Pardon?' and we did it on an 8 track hard disk recorder that we borrowed from a friend. Actually the second one was mostly recorded on that too. Anyway that first album is called 'Pardon?' because it was just about the worst album title we could come up with and that made us laugh.

The second was recorded the following year. We called that 'I Can Dancing and Walking' because I'd once owned a cheap bird puppet and that was printed proudly on the side. For some reason the phrase had stuck with me over the intervening years, and although it didn't make us laugh I did find it mildly amusing.

The third was recorded on a computer with a new microphone. That became known as 'Everything Has to End Somewhere' because it was the title of one of the tracks. It didn't make me laugh until Miss Ping produced the cover which featured a zebra having problems with a dead pig. It does seem a shame to have used that title and then gone on to make another album, but there you go. Incidentally Miss Ping was so dissatisfied with her Zebra she had screwed the picture up and thrown it away. I had to rescue it from the bin, which is why there is a crease down the middle.

Now we have put together a fourth album. This one is called 'Nothing is Lost' - a title that is unlikely to raise so much as a chuckle. The back cover has a picture of a group of chicks in what looks to me a military formation. Like a fowl based Triumph of the Will. I'm sure there's humour somewhere in that."

'Nothing is Lost' is the fourth album by the melancholic Brighton based duo Things in Herds. For the most part the songs are written by Pete Lush and Miss Ping creates the peculiar images. They are far-flung members of the Fife based 'Fence Collective', with whom they released their previous album 'Everything Has to End Somewhere'.

Miss Ping spent a considerable amount of time developing a spectacular and rather grandiose 'Horse War' slide show for the tours that accompanied 'Everything has to End Somewhere'. Unfortunately, as the group were travelling by train and their suitcases were already full of drums and synthesizers, this had to be scaled down to a small set of postcards. These were to become slightly scuffed from being passed around the venues and for many people it was difficult to see them clearly in the low light.

They have plans to give their next album a slightly more cheerful title and to develop a small but powerful, lightweight slide projector. Or buy a car..