Friday 6th September

Forget the stupid name, which may have been a deliberate ploy – a sort of anti-fame, don’t take us seriously, name.  The band started out with four members but to all intents and purposes it is really all down to one man, Paddy MacAloon, the singer, songwriter and guitarist.  From the start they produced immaculate pop records, with a cool sophistication beyond their years.  They were part of a new wave of talent in the early eighties which included Deacon Blue and Aztec Camera and Everything But The Girl.  These bands were in themselves a rebound from the years of Glam and then the awful descent into Punk itself.

But Prefab Sprout always stood above even this crowded field.  From their first album ‘Swoon’ up to their masterpiece ‘Jordan- the Comeback’ with its almost impenetrable lyrics, talking of King David and Atlantis and Harlem they created a microcosm, a world you could descend into when the real world got too much.

Paddy has had real health problems, first with his eyesight and then his hearing, and has amassed whole unreleased albums that he either is disinclined to finish, or simply doesn’t want to let us have just yet.  Occasionally he lets slip a record, often years after they were first recorded, and a new one is waiting for release in October of this year.

A true genius, who wrote the immaculate lines “Desire is a sylph-figured creature who changes her own mind”; so full of wistfulness and understanding of the delicate relations between men and women.

Their Greatest Hits Album ‘A Life Of Surprises’ is just that – no fillers, no big hits, but great songs, beautifully sung, one after the other – all gems; it is an album I never tire of.