Description

2004 cd release

Spinal Tap rip-off or hilarious English parody-of-a-parody? Comedy is so subjective to review — either you laugh or you don’t — but Bad News provides more belly laughs than Spinal Tap. The essential difference in Bad News shtick versus their Stateside counterparts is while the latter parodied the excesses of arena-rock stardom by focusing on a band good enough to be welcomed to the machine but stupid enough to be lost in it, Bad News (Comic Strip and Young Ones regulars Rik Mayall, Niger Planer, and Adrian Edmonson, along with actor and writer Peter Richardson) focuses on a band that barely have enough talent to record a song — and if you’ve ever spent time in a band in high school or college, the petty bickering and dumb behaviour of Bad News rings true. Interspersed between several intentionally terrible (and thankfully short) songs such as Drink Till I Die and Masturbike are what sound like mainly improvised and edited routines, wherein the band tries to record a Tolkein-meets-Iron Maiden mood-setting introduction (Excalibur), attempts to get one good song out of the bass player (Hey, Mr. Bassman), and engages in lots of funny arguing and, eventually, fighting. The album holds up over time, with many throwaway jokes revealing themselves only after years of listening. Recommended to fans of 1980s British humor. This reissue the Yuletide hit single Cashing in on Christmas together with other bonus material

Track listing:
1. Hey Hey Bad News
2. We Havent Recorded Anything Yet
3. Warriors Of Genghis Khan
4. Excalibur
5. Bohemian Rhapsody-take one
6. Bohemian Rhapsody-take two
7. The Contract
8. Introducing The Band
9. Bad News
10. Hey Mr Bassman
11. Masturbike
12. What Are You Going To Wear For Top Of The Pops
13. Drink Till I Die
14. Maybe We Should Plug The Guitars In
15. Pretty Woman
16. Life With Brian
17. Bad Reams
18. A.G.M.
19. O Levels
20. Double Entendre
21. Cashing In On Christmas-dub version
22. Cashing In On Christmas