sound of the suburbs

Therapy have proven to be a difficult band to pin down, their infuences include the classic metal bands such as Black Sabbath as well as more hip names such as Husker Du, this dual personality was mirrored in the early 90's press as they were well received by both the more fashionable side as well as the traditional hard rock inkies. The band also displayed a good sense of melody and were capable of turning their hands to composing catchy pop gems that left many a band jealous. Their self released debut single was picked up by John Peel who wasted little time in inviting them down to Maida Vale for the first of two sessions in August 1991, a three song set that contained 'Innocent Abstraction', 'Prison Breaker' and 'Perversonality', their second and final Peel session would be recorded in November the following year. Therapy's following two releases the EPs 'Baby Teeth' and 'Pleasure Death' were on the indie label Wijja, the second of which was to include the 'Potato Junkie' with it's classic chorus concerning James Joyce and someone's sister, for many of us this is a classic Irish sing a long song! Such was the buzz around the band that the majors wasted little time and their following releases were on the A&M imprint, and included the hit 'Screamager'. The band are still around and would appear to have deservedly kept a firm fan base, a recently released live album is available through their web site.


I had the good luck to catch up with Therapy in Montpellier back in their 90's hey day and can assure you that they were a damn good live band giving real meaning to the term power trio! They returned to Montpellier April 15, 2005 and unfortunately I missed out on this though those that were present are always telling me that I missed out on one of the gigs of the year. I have three songs for you from that gig 'Potato Junkie', U2 fans are not to take the song's introduction too seriously, a wonderful cover of 'Isolation/She's Lost Control', from the cover stars of the February edition of Mojo and a hot 'n' sweaty 'Screamager'. The photo comes from a Dutch gig on the same tour so I guess energy levels were high on all dates! The band seemed to have a good time as drummer Neil Cooper has the following to say on their web site about the gig "Montpellier seemed like a really nice place. Gig was really cool - thanks to the fella for getting in the tequila shots. The venue - Le Rockstore - was great. We danced the night away at the rock club after the show and got ever so slightly inebriated." Hard life isn't it?