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Although
the John Peel session had engendered some record
company interest, no declarations of intent
resulted in any commitment to finance, record or
release anything by the group. Feeling the momentum created by
the Peel session and few snippets in the music
press ebbing away, the Funboy Five decided the
next step should be an independently-released
single. This became ’Life After
Death’/’Compulsive Eater’.
However, before the
single was recorded significant changes occurred
in the group’s personnel.
Having already lost a
bass player, the group now lost a drummer,
Robert, leaving just the two founder members,
Mick Sinclair and John McRae.
A bass player, Dave
Tyler, aged 17 and still at school, joined the
group. A drummer, Paul Ingram, previously in the Anal
Surgeons was persuaded to fill the vacant drum stool. Another ex-Anal Surgeon, John Goddard, played bass with the band at several gigs before the arrival of Mr Tyler, including one where the other band on the bill had a guitarist who looked like a toby jug.
The cost of recording the
single, on January 6, 1980, and its pressing,
left no money available for the sleeve.
As a result, the disc was
clothed in a plain white inner sleeve with a stapled fold-over piece of
A4 paper with hand- and type-written info on the
band. But it was available in a choice of colours:
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Greatly influenced by – or possibly
under the influence of – the
recently-released film, Phantasm, Mick was cast
as ‘The Tall Man’.
The single, the first
release on the Cool-Cat-Daddy-O label, received the expected
plays on the John Peel Show, various other radio
spins, a few reviews, and sold a greatly
encouraging 650 copies within a week of its
release. Much less encouraging was the fact that
it sold hardly any thereafter.
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