“Someone’s Stolen My Feet” / “I Wonder Why” (Guerssen SG002) 1996
Vibraphone | Someone’s Stolen My feet | Guerssen | 1996 | A photograph of Vibraphone turned up on Facebook this week and it triggered a memory in my mind that I actually owned their one and only single on the Spanish Guerssen label.
I probably bought this from Detour Records back in the day, I used to buy hundreds of records from them in the early to mid-nineties. Mostly items by new mod bands from Europe, which was their scene, and some of the 45s were great but some were so bad I’d play them once and forget about them. Vibraphone was one of those really bad records.
The best thing about the single is the front cover photo of the band looking like bedraggled pill-poppers and stoned rat-catchers. But after the visual delights of the sleeve it all goes downhill from there.
Both songs offered sound like unfinished demo recordings. “Someone’s Stolen My Feet” could easily have been one of those joke songs Neil from ‘The Young Ones’ had on his LP but looking at the song credit it was written by Louis Wigget.
They aim at a late-sixties UK psych rock vibe and are only partially successful mainly because of the lead guitarist, who plays with a certain degree of cockiness. But sadly it’s a nothing song.
Vibraphone | Someone’s Stolen My feet | Guerssen | 1996
The flip “I Wonder Why” is another band original, written by Chris Jordan. This lo-fi number is perhaps saved in a way by the mid-song Creation-style fuzz rumble but the vocalist struggles throughout and the song just meanders on and on into nothingness. They actually sound bored playing this but didn’t really know how to end it . . . thankfully it eventually fizzled out.
Some members went onto form Bronco Bullfrog, who I believe were more successful and released four albums between 1998 to 2004.
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