The Origins Of Cats Against The Bomb

Start at the very beginning:

Cats Against The Bomb began at Essex Uni in 1999, at the arse end of their teens and sick of being in shit indie bands, going nowhere, sounding like everyone else (and without a decent drummer, so actually not even as good as everyone else).

Top cat Floodman had a theory, and wanted to find if it held true.

Moore's Law

The theory was in two parts, and went something like this:

"1. Anything that can be done in hardware can be done in software."

"2. If Moore's law states that computing power doubles every 18 months, surely there must be enough power in a cheap home PC to muck about with sound like The KLF and Public Enemy did in the late 80's, and make an album out of it."

First Universal Cybernetic Kinetic Universal Programmer

Using a 90mhz First Universal Cybernetic Kinetic Universal Programmer PC with a colossal 16MB of RAM, and an entire 512MB of disk space, the debut album "Firecracker" was recorded and released on CD-R.

There was no money, too many ideas, too little equipment, and too many toasted sandwiches.

The album embraced all that was held in disdain by the indie scene, the unfashionable (Cliff Richard, Gay Dad), manufactured (PJ and Duncan, Billie), added a smidgen of noise, and pop record from it.

Floodman will argues this proves that you can make an exciting pop record using unimaginative bits and pieces. Whether you agree, is up to you.

16 Bit Bastards

Mixmaster Mick and the legendary Fucktrumpet, veterans from opposing sides of the 16 Bit wars, were drafted in for live work and early recordings, including Smack Me Up Gun Bitch.

Peel!

In 2000, finals fast approaching, Cats Against The Bomb received a call from John Peel inviting them to record a session.

"Yes indeedy" was the response, and CATB played in the enormous MV3 studio, recording (for better or worse) their most polished recordings.

Skip a bit...The Skill-less Years

The Peel session came and went, and CATB didn't even get to play Dublin Castle out of it, but did play a role in later developments...

Mixmaster Mick and Fucktrumpet got into yet another argument over whether the ST or Amiga were better, and buggered of to do better things for more money.

Between 2000 and 2003, Floodman continued to record bits and bobs, and side projects, but spent a lot of time actually learning to play the guitar, and practising singing Karaoke (trying to impress girls mostly).

Cats Against The Bomb - The Return

In late 2003 Cats Against The Bomb were back!

Now slimmed down to Floodman on ajuitar and Vocals, and Rio5000 on drums and synths, the band had taken on a mass of influences in the hiatus.

Japanese rock and roll, noise pop, Grindcore, and a lot of stuff where the lyrics don't matter.

The wilfully perverse pop element still remains - at times taking influence from Girls Aloud for the drumbeats, and Rachel Stevens for the synths.

Gigging / Recording

For the a few years Cats Against The Bomb have been gigging - The Far Out Sound from the Far East (Anglia, that is).

During this time, lots of new material for a new album was being written and recorded, but in 2005 a chance encounter caused a change in direction.

Sprintette!

In a pub Floodman randomly met independent film maker Patio Sprintette, who had actually heard and enjoyed the Peel session a few years back. He had wondered "Who the hell are they?".

Finally, he got an answer and events took a different turn.

Film

Patio Sprintette was making an ultra-low-budget movie called "Attack of The Bunny Boilers From The Nth Lagoon", in his house and guerilla-ing it, where he wouldn't get caught.

Filming was going well, but not finished yet, and he needed someone to do the soundtrack.

Enter Cats Against The Bomb.

Attack of the Bunny Boilers from the Nth Lagoon: The Musical

Attack of the Bunny Boilers From The Nth Lagoon The Musical(AOTBBFTNTHLTM) is the culmination of a three year collaboration between Cats Against The Bomb and producer/director Patio Sprintette. The forthcoming movie is released by Sprintette's own Shed Flix, and will be showing at Garden Centres up and down the UK on Sundays only throughout 2008. Showings will be held in specially constructed cine-sheds.

The movie follows ex-special forces soldier Kurt Bruce, in which he travels to a remote tropical island to do battle with, enemy of all things fluffy, The Greatest Psycho Of Them All. Along the way he encounters terrifying office equipment, meets then falls in love with an android, faces off against an agressive diplomat, and ponders the meaning of life, love, cake, death, the universe and artificial intelligence. Standard stuff really.

The 27 track soundtrack consists of many Cats Against The Bomb tracks written in the Skill-less years, which Sprintette was able to weave into the plot of the movie, as well as pieces of music written to match Sprintette's cinematic vision.

Skip To The End

Cats Against The Bomb are a “plutonium” rock and roll band. Taking influences from everything around them, so much so that the sound is like its radioactive - packed full of ideas that radiate out from the songs at explosive speeds.

Attack of the Bunny Boilers From The Nth Lagoon The Musical (Original Soundtrack Recording) is the second full album from Cats Against The Bomb. CATB are noiser, faster, and harder than ever before.