What do you do in the bath?

February 24th, 2003. Cambridge Junction. 7pm. I arrived at the venue in great anticipation of seeing one of the most exciting Folktronica acts on the circuit at the time: Lemon Jelly. Of course I wasn't disappointed.

Most of their work up to that point was distilled down to 3 beautifully crafted EPs in 1998-2000 (also released as an 'album' in 2000 known rather amusingly as LemonJelly.KY ) but with the release of 2002's Lost Horizons, it catapulted the duo of Nick Franglen and Fred Deakin into the consciousness of the mainstream music scene.

An XL label artist, they were a million miles away from The Prodigy in their aesthetic, adopting a very folksy, somewhat comical and very much laid back approach to their music. Not to say their compositions were in any way a joke; far from it. Franglen and Deakin have crafted some absolutely beautiful tracks through a combination of superb musicianship, love of nostalgia, cutesy/weird/profound vocal sampling and some downright wonderful rhythms and beats. It is also worthy of note that their album artwork was beautiful (see below for images).

Nice Weather For Ducks was their first Top 20 chart hit, and it stayed there for 3 weeks having followed previous single Spacewalk that topped out at number 36. Even if you don't think you know the tune, play the first 30 seconds on Spotify and you will immediately have your memory jogged!

From what I remember from 17 years ago (!) the live show was amazing, with an array of instruments from the electric cello to bongos, banjo and keyboards along with a superb vector art driven media backdrop to all the songs.

2005's effort '64-'95 followed with 3 further top 40 singles, and it was somewhat thematic as the group had taken tracks reminiscent of various years, and adapted, mixed and overwritten them to create new tunes complete with sampling and instrumentation. The total coup for the album was enlisting the vocal talents of one Mr William Shatner on final track '64 AKA Go, and as a childhood fan of the Star Trek TV series and motion pictures, his words were enough to send shivers down my spine.

The music of course speaks for itself, but my standout tracks across their releases are:

In The Bath

His Majesty King Raam

The Staunton Lick

Page One

Elements

Spacewalk

Ramblin' Man

Nice Weather For Ducks

'68 AKA Only Time

'75 AKA Stay With You

'64 AKA Go

There's a certain majesty and difference in the music that Lemon Jelly created that hasn't really been repeated in the genre, and that alone is why they're worthy of a revisit (or a first visit if you've never listened before). For me, their tenure as a group was far too short-lived and they have been on hiatus since 2008. I live in hope of their return at some point and maybe the last 10 months of 2020 has done what it has to many dormant artists: jolted some creativity into the boys and sparked new ideas.

Here's hoping.

Badger x