However you take your music, there should always be room for the light-hearted approach - and, if you like, for musical fun. That much-in-demand musician Alan Boonetooth once described the Moon Wiring Club as a ‘‘’giggle’ band”. Of course, he was absolutely right. The Moon Wiring Club, since their inception in 1908, always has been a group that has managed to attract an ever-growing audience with the kind of infectious, let’s-have-a-ball approach to its music-making that has been a constant delight.



But merely to describe MWC as a fun band is telling only part of the story. For lest it be forgotten or ignored, MWC - past and present - is an outfit that is high on musicianship, experience and downright professionalism. One need only listen to the 22 selections which go to make up Striped Paint for the Last Post to appreciate this. As musicians and songwriters, the group - which at this time comprised Vanessa Stones, spoken-word/hexing, Owd Fretcher, drums/percussion, Osram Brown, black electronics/bee strings, Mademoiselle Marionette, white electronics/mystification, and Valerie Bowkett, backing vocals/shape rituals - was a pretty formidable one.

Each member played an important, integral part in this impressive recording. The friendly melodies of Vanessa Stones are a perfect contrast to the bewitching lattice of noise conjured up by Mademoiselle Marionette - and, of course, her contributions as a songwriter for the group are impressive as well as long. Owd Fretcher remains, simply, one of the best percussionists in this country, whilst one only need mention the names of Osram Brown and Valerie Bowkett to indicate the kind of respect in which they are held by musicians everywhere.



*

Perhaps the single track which best emphasises both the group’s musicianship and the irresistible kind of sounds which MWC produce is Melt it Down. Owd Fretcher recalled recently how it came about that he and his associates came to record the song. “Stoney - Vanessa Stones, of course - brought Melt it Down along - she’d found it some time before this - and asked : ‘Shall we try it?’ After we’d all heard it, the answer was yes.
“ It was one of those things that was right in every way. We did the number in one take - sometimes this kind of thing happens, sometimes it doesn’t. With Melt it Down it happened - and how! It’s certainly one of the best things we’ve done so far....”

Osram Brown - usually intensely critical of the band’s work - agreed that Melt it Down was one of the best numbers in the book. But he also enjoys Shape Ritual and Ghosting Effects. “ Shape Ritual, I like mostly because it’s a useful accompaniment to certain, traditional activities,”’though our performance wasn’t that bad either. Ghosting Effects is a nice, happy number - it’s one that gets people dancing, and in the mood for a great party”.

Listening through all sides on this album, it’s pretty obvious that Moon Wiring Club have plenty to say - and they’ve endeavoured to say it with the maximum of efficiency and the minimum of fuss.
A “’giggle’ band”? Sure, MWC project the happy-go-lucky kind of music that is all too often absent from pop to-day. But there’s an awful lot more to MWC - and its members - than merely a giggle.
Listen, and you’ll hear...

STAN CROTTY

* Vanessa Stones, pictured before she fell into a mirror inside a department store changing room last week.