In 1983 ‘The Young Ones’ was funny, fresh and anarchic. The ‘Comic Strip Presents…’ was perhaps even better. In fact in some ways it seemed Rik Mayall, Peter Richardson, Ade Edmondson and Nigel Planer could do no wrong. But they could, or so it soon transpired. They could take what was a faintly grittier Spinal Tap, an extended joke about lavatories, a new found confidence with the UK music chart courtesy of two cheesy no.1 singles (‘Living Doll’ and ‘Hole In My Shoe’) and launch the worryingly half-real, half-ironic and half-arsed Bad News. Anyway, for anyone who didn’t quite laugh out loud enough the first time around, EMI Catalogue have re-released the crude, rude and stupefyingly juvenile ‘Bad News’ album. Why? Why do bears shit in woods? Why does the sun rise in the morning? Why do former alternative comic icons to a generation try to revive their flagging fortunes? They just do.
It’s a release that will no doubt remind a million spotty thirtysomethings that they were once tissue clutching, hormonal thirteen-somethings who would laugh at anything if it alluded in any way, shape or form to anything like ‘bumming’ or masturbation or included the word ‘fart’ – but it’s far from the defining cultural satire it would have us believe. Rock bands were always ridiculous; the joke was already as old as Methuselah before the Comic Strip donned their tight leopard skin pants and staggered their way through ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ and coined such youth-friendly anthems as ‘Drink Till I Die’ and ‘O Levels’.
Perhaps it was funny at the time. Perhaps it wasn’t funny at the time. Like it or not you’ve got to sit through it all again and pretend it was at least.