Formed
by Edwin Pouncey in the Spring of 1977 “because there was a talent night at the
Royal College Of Art”, their first gig ended (like so many of their other gigs)
in a fight, to disguise their lack of material. Someone there offered them a
gig for money so a set of 10 songs was quickly cobbled together.
Sometime
during 1977 the band decided to go and records some tracks for a possible
release. They settled on Pathway Studiosd in London where The Damned had
recorded “New Rose” and two tracks “Chickens in Funland” and “Rat City” were
recorded. Just one acetate was made and soon after the line-up changed, Ricky
Slaughter left to join The Motors, Robert Gotobed went to Wire and the line-up
stabilised to include the nucleus of Edwin Pouncey, Steve Spear and Marion
Fudger. The idea got scrapped.
A
hippie guy and his stripper girlfriend who ran a record shop in the basement of
Kensington Market decided to start a label and approached the Art Attacks. They
released the 7,500 selling "I Am A Dalek" b/w "Neutron
Bomb" single, but the relationship terminated when the stripper appeared
on stage semi-naked and decided to whip an unamused Edwin.
Their
next foray into the studio was to record the classic "Arabs In
‘Arrads" for the first ever punk rock compilation album,
"Streets" on Beggars Banquet.
Suffering
from stage fright, Edwin would only appear on-stage when inebriated. Each
performance was unpredictable. Aside from the frequent fights, there was one
occasion when Edwin climbed inside the kick drum and refused to perform, and
once when he invited a tramp to ramble meaninglessly into the microphone, rather
than sing himself.
Tours
with The Lurkers, Generation X, The Motors and Rock Against Racism followed, as
did two live tracks "Animal Bondage" and "Frankenstein’s
Heartbeat" on the "Live At The Vortex" album. The pressures of
finishing their degrees terminated the band and the posthumous "Punk Rock
Stars" b/w "Rat City" single was released.
Sadly,
in 2017 Steve Spear died in a road traffic accident and Edwin felt it would be
a great tribute if the long lost single could be released. Following some detective
work, it was discovered that the acetate had been bought on eBay by an Italian
collector who kindly taped it. Edwin still had his original 1977 artwork and wrote
a band history and tribute to Steve which is included as an insert within the
release.
