Noisettes are the supremely talented vocalist Shingai Shoniwa, guitarist Dan Smith and drummer Jamie Morrison.
For much of the early noughties Dan and Shangai played shambolic jazz-noise gigs under the moniker Sonarfly, who made healthy men prolapse and children run screaming into the paths of trucks. Or, as they put it, "it didn't work out with our previous drummer". But fate fondled their dangles the day they parted company with said drummer, two days before heading into the studio to record the first Noisettes demo, and four days before their next gig Jamie Morrison, the afro'd veteran of around 16 previous bands who'd never done a days work in his life was psychedelically mental enough to join The Noisettes.
Obviously Jamie was in and so began the most unconventional and imaginative band in modern rock. They are united by blues, psychedelic music and rock. They've played their instruments with Hovis, done gigs straight from hit and run accidents (Shingai was run over days before a gig) and have done tap-dance busking gigs in Greenwich. And most dangerous of all, they took their lives in their own hands to play support on the riot-plagued Babyshambles tour of 2004.
Even their record deal was bizarre. Releasing 'The Three Moods' on the tiny Side Salad label in the UK, they found themselves unexpectedly snapped up by no less legendary a label than Motown in America. Cue a debut album recorded between Croydon and California, and reflecting all the chaos and confusion that entails.
Hit-and-runs, stripping geese-women, wild-haired reclusive drummers and the sabotage of everything evil in rock, Cuddle up to The Noisettes: they'll give you sweet psychedelic nightmares.
