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The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster: Rocket, Leeds

Dave Simpson, The Guardian, 29 November 2002

OF THE MANY odd pop movements born in the 1980s, few were quite so peculiar as psychobilly. A mutant blend of punk, rockabilly and Vincent Price's wardrobe, the movement's deranged spirit was best captured by the notorious King Kurt. The band's hairstyles looked like glued-on tyre fragments, and their gigs were riots of flying bags of flour, vegetables and bodily excretions. Full-page adverts for their outrageously titled Stiff Records debut — which read, ahem, "King Kurt's Big Cock is out on Stiff" — caused a national outcry.

Total word count of piece: 371

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