KUNT AND THE GANG I Have Another Wank And I Have Another Cry (Disco Minge)

This Essex beat combo are arguably most notorious for their internet-based chartbombing campaigns targeted at times of organised national happiness (such as Christmas and royal weddings) that have seen them achieve two genuine pop hits with titles that I doubt I’d get away with quoting here. Their plinky-plonky electronica is oddly reminiscent of the early work of fellow Basildon residents Depeche Mode (heck, they’ve even got a song called “Just Can’t Get Enough”), but their lyrical obsessions with sex and celebrity posit them as an x-rated John Shuttleworth. The brutal economy with which the songs end the moment they lyrics are exhausted is suggestive, perhaps accidentally, of Wire and Minutemen.

Centrepiece of the “Wanking And Crying” trilogy, and perhaps best heard in that context, “I Have Another Wank And I Have Another Cry” was originally released in 2006. There’s the occasional variation on its predictable themes – “Arranged Bride”, for instance, models a Caribbean lilt somewhat at odds with its topic, and “Young Girl” isn’t a cover of the Gary Puckett And The Union Gap song, despite a certain overlap in its sentiments – but mostly this is the stuff of Viz comic cover discs, should such an entity ever exist.

KUNT AND THE GANG Here’s One I Knocked Out Earlier (Disco Minge/Club Tuppence) 

Branded, with admirable self-awareness, with a “Parental Advisory Low Quality Filth” warning, this 2009 collection of rare, unreleased and acoustic material is actually a more satisfactory listen than the bona fide Kunt And The Gang album above. There’s a greater variety of instrumentation, the acoustic versions meaning that not every track relies on the primitive sounds of the Kawai K1R synth, and broader subject matter, taking in trenchant commentary on sport, social issues and the media.  

“Heather Mills” is notable for its brutal early 80s drum machine sounds, and “Rachel Riley” for its somewhat baffling reggae stylings. Desperation sets in on the blatant commercial pandering of “Kunt And The Gang Megamix”, but “There’s A Child Molester Living In Grays” models a chorus that surely any early-80s synthpop duo would happily swap their Revox for.

Should your desire for Kuntmusic not be sated by the album proper, a second disc subtitled “Leftover, Infringed and Libellous” is available as a download, containing such unsellable gems as “The Model” (which, the sleevenotes record, “would probably have made it on to the first album had someone not pointed out the similarity to another song coincidentally of the same name”), “Pete Townshend From The Who” and “Come On Cliff, Admit You’re Queer”

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