Miscellaneous - Nude Nudes

  by Jon Rogers

published: 31 / 1 / 2004

Label: Select Label
Format: N/A

intro

Jon Rogers profiles Honey Tongue's virtually forgotten classic from 1992, 'Nude Nudes', a one-off collaboration between the Breeders and Perfect Disaster's Josephine Wiggs and ex-Spiritualized/Spacemen 3 drummer, Jon Mattock

Released in April 1992, this collaboration between the Breeders and Perfect Disaster's Josephine Wiggs and ex-Spiritualized/Spacemen 3 and sometime Breeders drummer Jon Mattock became virtually forgotten about almost immediately after it had been issued. Not only did it have to contend with the possibility that critics would see it as some sort of one-off vanity side project and not quite in the same league as the day job. As well, back in 1992 any female with any credentials as a serious musician had to battle against all the attention PJ Harvey was getting with her debut album 'Dry'. Wiggs, when she was playing with the under-rated Perfect Disaster, first crossed paths with Mattock when he was still in Spacemen 3 and they began what Wiggs has described as "extracurricular playing". Essentially, the album 'Nude Nudes' is the result of that involvement. The story is rather more convoluted than that though with the paths of the various bands intermingling along the way. In 1989 Wiggs, still in the ranks of Perfect Disaster, teamed up with then Pixies' Kim Deal and Throwing Muses' Tanya Donnelly to form the Breeders but the following year Perfect Disaster record what was to be their last album 'Heaven Scent' with one Jon Mattock sitting behind the drum kit. With the break-up of the band, Wiggs jets off to the States to work on the Breeders full-time after the release of the album 'Pod'. After rehearsals the band come to London to record the song 'Safari' - and once again Mattock is there to keep time. After that the pair start taking their "extracurricular playing" a little more seriously in April 1991 and start rehearsing and recording some demos in earnest. The collaboration comes to the attention of Paula Greenwood who at the time was running Playtime Records and is keen to release the result. In December that year the pair spend 15 days at Startrack studios in Manchester with Audu Abaje recording and mixing the nine songs. The result is quite unlike any of the bands the pair had been involved with in the past. Rejecting the guitar histrionics and feedback of the Breeders and Spacemen 3 Wiggs, as she was first amongst equals, plumped for soft, late-night murmurings ideal for sipping malt whisky alone and with the lights out. Any abrasive qualities had been ironed out but it still couldn't be accused of being soft. The acoustic 'Like A Lobster' has a gentle lilt as if relaxing on summer lawns but still manages to get in a few little lyrical punches while 'Big Girls Blouse' is equally barbed but coats the sharpness in humour. Although 'Nude Nudes' has the feel of being almost recorded as live in fact Wiggs played most of the instruments on the album and it is really her little baby but the two clearly work well together. 'On Thursdays' Wiggs' cello merges effortlessly with Mattock's percussion to create an album of real unexpected pleasure. Mattock and Wiggs would once again collaborate on a further project, one that would emphasise the predominance of Wiggs, in the Josephine Wiggs Experience and take a more indie-pop stance with the album 'Bon Bon Life'. But that, as the saying goes, is another story.

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