There are few albums I can listen to that I first bought in 1991, yet Five Thirty's Bed still sounds as fresh and poignant as it did all those years ago. Let us go back to 1990......Back then I was listening to the likes of Neds Atomic Dustbin, The Wonderstuff, Jesus Jones and was also getting excited about this thing they called the Madchester scene, especially a hot four-piece combo called The Stones Roses.
It was whilst walking around Sheffield City Centre that I noticed some small psychedelic posters advertising the latest single by an unknown band (to me anyway) called Five Thirty. Not long after seeing the posters I saw a single review in the now sadly demised "Melody Maker" for "Abstain"- Five Thirty's (proper) debut single. The reviewer likened the single to Jesus Jones, that was enough for me, I bought the debut on cassette single. When parting with my money in Warp Records on Division Street in Sheffield little did I know this had started an OCD type obsession for collecting Five Thirty's material (I later also bought the CD single, the 7", the 12" and the Promo 12" of Abstain). Needless to say I no longer listen to Jesus Jones...... This OCD type obsession did not stop with Five Thirty. It carried on with Paul Bassetts next band Orange Deluxe and continues today with Pauls current activities with the Eskimo Project. Hopefully when this blog comes to a standstill I will create an Orange Deluxe blog and then an Eskimo Project blog.
This Five Thirty blog will eventually contain loads of scans from the music papers of the time (interviews, reviews, adverts etc), original Five thirty newsletters and promo photographs, all that I have lovingly scanned in and messed around with these last few weeks before starting this blog. I will try to do the blog in a chronological order, but I am sure it will stray at times.
Five Thirty seem to have somewhat of a cult following now. I wished I had a quid for every time I saw words that implied "Five Thirty were the band that should have been" on these pages we call the super highway. So if any of you cult members want to help by passing jpegs on please email them to me at lee_rourke@yahoo.co.uk
Just to get you started here are a couple of early interviews, one from March 31st 1990 in Sounds magazine and the other from March 10 1990 in NME magazine. Following them is a live review taken at a gig at the Camden Falcon around the same time. Hope you enjoy the articles!
