Senseless Things

The Senseless Things' bounding, enthusuastic blend of loud guitars, punk tempos, and bubblegummy pop melodies made a splash on the British scene in the early 1990s. After a few indie singles, including the insistent "Too Much Kissing," the band turned out a fine trio of albums notable for their Jamie Hewlett-drawn covers, their mix of snappy singles, and their more thoughtful, sometimes political album tracks. 

Formed in 1987 in the town of Twickenham in West London, the band (Mark Keds on guitar and vocals, Ben Harding on guitar and vocals, Cass Browne on drums, Morgan Nicholls on bass) made a series of fast, melodic, and charmingly light-hearted singles for indie label Way Cool. Their 1988 album, 'Postcard C.V.', solidified their feel-good punk style and found them sounding like a perfect mix of the Buzzcocks and The Undertones with a little Archies thrown in. Around this time, the band struck up a friendship with Jamie Hewlett, creator of "Tank Girl", and their record sleeves featured his work. A single taken from the album, "Too Much Kissing," soon became a solid indie hit and a larger label, Decoy, snapped up the band. Decoy was the home of the Mega City Four, another fine British pop-punk group. 

 

The Senseless Things released two well-received EPs in 1990, and after a storming appearance at the Reading Festival and a packed house tour of U.K. clubs, Epic Records signed them. The band was maturing musically and their first album for Epic found them utilizing acoustic guitars and exploring slower tempos. 1991's 'First of Too Many' was a medium-sized hit, as were the singles taken from it, and the band seemed poised for more success. The next album, 1993's 'Empire of the Senseless', showed the band maturing lyrically as well. "Homophobic Asshole" was the first single from the record and although it was not a huge commercial hit, it showed that the band may have a future beyond bubblegum punk, but it was not to be. They released one more album, 1995's 'Taking Care of Business', and split after one last tour. 

 

The band felt they had taken their sound as far as they could and decided to move in other directions. Keds formed a band called Jolt in late 1995, and would later perform with Deadcuts and The Wildhearts; Harding played with 3 Colours Red; Nichols released a solo album then joined The Streets and Muse as a live bassist; Browne was a vital part of Gorillaz for a decade and in 2019 formed the band Loup GarouX with Ed Harcourt. Along with all this indiviual activity, there was a brief Senseless Things reunion in 2007, then a more serious one in 2017 that resulted in a new single called "Lost Honey." Any chance of further concerts or recordings was curtailed by the death of Mark Keds in January of 2021. [SOURCE: ALLMUSIC]