The peoples' democratic blog of Matt Hayward

Got a post from a Facebook group today. Apparently the Skunk Anansie Myspace page started up approx 6 months ago and it’s run by the band!

For those of you that don’t know of them Skunk Anansie are a British four piece that melded the best of dub/reggae with metal and rock. Tough girly girl Skin fronts the band and is like a black, sexy and female Peter Garrett! Even the name itself is like a split between black and white. Skunk being the obvious and Anansie I think is some kind of fairy tale Jamaican spider or something. Hey it toughened up the name though!

SA only released 3 albums. A more political, metally debut with Paranoid and Sunburnt, which was sampled by the Prodigy on Fat of the Land. The next one was Stoosh. This was far more melodic and mellow and showed a completely different style of songwriting. Skin’s vocals were awesome and it’s almost a Hendrixy vibe to some ballads like Hedonism. Probably because a bloke called Len Arran got involved. Stoosh is definitely one of my favourite albums of the early noughties.

Sadly the final opus Post Orgasmic Chill could’ve been a lot better. It had some epic songs on it like Follow me down, The Skankheads and Charlie Big Potato. But wreaked of filler tracks, songs written around effects pedals and contractual obligation. The writing on the wall of a break up was clearly there. Fortunately you could tell there was still plenty left in the band and thankfully it looks like there’s still a lot of fight left in the dog!

Even each respective member is awesome. Aside from the raunchy Skin (whose done at least two solo albums), Cass the bass player is a Barbadosian(?) dreaded monster who rocks right out. Mark the drummer has been known to break more than just sticks he hits so hard and Ace the guitarist rocks it pretty hard.

I’m told by Mr Facebook group guy (does the internet ever lie?) that surprises are imminent. If nothing else the Skunks are a high energy, rock band with a big dub and dance twist. There hardly your boring arsed Nickelcrack, Matchbox 20 FM rock. So brace yourself from something awesome! Looks like the Skunks are back!