M.J. Hibbett & the Validators – We Validate!
Hooray for Spoilt Victorian Child, for not only has Simon being busy filling the life of the lovely Liz with sunshine, he has also consistently and generously made time to fill the rest of our lives with quality tunery. So bless his Spoilt Victorian Socks, because a few months back I came across these characters on his website – what a quality find!
Put as glibly as possibly, Hibbett is a modern day cross between Billy Bragg and the Wedding Present’s David Gedge, most particularly in his ability to turn everyday sentences into perfectly metered verse without the slightest hint of contrivance. He also manages a well-judged range of subject matter from the banal everyday observation to the angry political rant, which brings real depth to this musically slightly ramshackle-sounding album. You can hear, in this, where Frank Turner’s influences are coming from as well, I’d reckon.
Not every song is brilliant mind, but most of them are pretty bloody good, and there’s a good half dozen absolute fucking gems to be found here. Between the fiddle and the anger and the guitar sound, this could easily have been released in about 1991, but there’s a lot of this kind of sound around at the moment and I am liking it. He has a new single out called The Gay Train, a dual A-Side with the equally brilliant Lesson of the Smiths, and the album as well, both of which are well worth your shilling. Fucking marvellous.
M.J. Hibbett & the Validators – The Gay Train
M.J. Hibbett & the Validators – The Fight for History
website | myspace | amazon
Your Billy David comparison is pretty spot on. There are some fantastic, laugh aloud lyrics on the album as well. Glad you’d recommend it.
Great stuff. I had heard the Lesson of the Smiths before (in fact, it may have been Elizabeth herself who posted it, or was it Simon? Well, those two are now merged into one by love anyhow so I suppose it doesn’t matter), but not these. I got the feeling from Lesson of the Smiths that maybe they were a bit of a novelty act, but you’ve disabused me. Good.
Yes, I heard The Lesson of the Smith on SVC and stuck it on a recent podcast as well. But a novelty act they surely are not.
If there’s a better song about Gayness from a straight man’s persepctive than The Gay Train then I have yet to hear it.