If you’re in the habit of checking out new releases on London garage label Dirty Water, you couldn’t have missed this extravagant singles compilation set by The Wildebeests from November last year. The Wildebeests is a trio with members from The Thanes, The Kaisers and The Milkshakes and were set to play the Big Stramash weekender next week. Sadly the festival, which had a reformed The Poets on the bill (finally with a reissue on Grapefruit), has had to be postponed, but I will still go to Edinburgh to check out The Higher State on the 29th.
The artwork is of course a spoof of the first Nuggets double-LP compilation on Elektra, subtitled “Original Artyfacts From the First Psychedelic Era”. Gnuggets becomes the latest in a long line of Wildebeests puns on ‘gnu’ (which is another name for the same animal), and includes great originals such as “One+One” and “1996” but also covers like “She Lives In a Time of Her Own” (13th Floor Elevators), “You Lie” (Missing Links) and “I’m Rowed Out” (The Eyes). The illustration style isn’t exactly my cup of tea, but you have to admire the lengths they’ve gone to achieve right level of detail. Sleeve picture from Mik Baro, where you’ll find more artwork images.
