BLACK AND WHITE MISFITS

Arty oddities on the late-70s punk scene, The Monochrome Set did things their way, alienating some. Generations that followed have been more appreciative, which is why they have intermittently regrouped and have a new album and book in the pipeline, as they tell Rob Hughes

- Rob Hughes

Sometime in 1978, The Monochrome Set found themselves auditioning for a German record company. “They hired this place and we played our stuff for them,” recalls frontman and chief songwriter Bid. “After a while they said, ‘You’re not jumping up and down! We want more spitting!’ So, we told them to fuck off. Another time, we were halfway through our set at the Royal Standard Hotel in Bradford when everyone started turning over their cups. The owner said, ‘That’s it, lads, get out of here. You’re not a punk band.’”

Such reactions were not uncommon. The London quartet may have been forged in the residual heat of punk, but they had little to do with their contemporaries. The Monochrome Set instead took their cues from The Velvet Underground, 60s R&B and West Coast garage-rock, filtered through the sometimes-fantastical visions of Bid and an arty sensibility that turned their live shows into sensory experiences.

Thematically, they could be dark and droll, literate and surreal. Often within the same song.

“We weren’t interested in what was happening outside,” Bid cautions. “The Velvets were only influential in that they showed you how to do something simple. You could have a guitar melody with interesting lyrics over the top. That’s really the signature of early Monochrome Set. In terms of having vague similarities to us, I think the closest two bands were Television and very early Blondie. It’s just people expressing themselves, experimenting with pop. I was influenced by Edward Lear, lyrically, but also Ogden Nash and the Carry On films. I once said that The Monochrome Set is basically Charles Hawtrey singing The Velvet Underground. You can’t get away from the British humour in there.”