My man, Andy Sandall, has asked to hear Grandma’s Kitchen by Sink. Interesting choice indeed because there are several different versions of the song floating around and a couple of interesting stories as well, but there isn’t time for all of that now.

Since Andy’s long been exiled to the distant shores of New Joisey it’s only fair to grant his wish, so here (I hope) is the version of the song that Andy asked for plus an earlier demo recording we did in 1988.

Yes, that is Tommy Stupid playing drums on the 1988 version. He was never a full time member of Sink, but he recorded this demo with us and played a few gigs that year after our original drummer, Pete, left the band. The 1988 version is faster and more tinny, also check out the crazy snare towards the end, “More gated reverb, Vicar?”

I think I played the slide solo on this version, but John Ruscoe wrote it and taught it to me so he may well have played it, but something tells me it was me. He certainly played the slide on the 1990 version as he had joined the band by then.

There was yet another version of Grandma’s Kitchen (I think) that we recorded for the first album, Another Love Triangle, but it never made it on. If I can dig that up I’ll add it to this post. What the hell, I’ll even add the Perfect Daze cover version too at some point.

BTW, the spoken intro the the 1990 version was added from a live cassette for inclusion on the Sink DVD that I put together last year….more on that some other time.

• Download the 1990 version (4.65MB)

Recorded as part of the Vega-Tables album sessions.
Ed: vocals & guitars - John Ruscoe: Guitars Paul: Bass - James Kermack: drums - Laurence Bell: vocals

• Download the 1988 demo version (2.97MB)

Recorded in North London (with Marty from the Stupids engineering).
Laurence Bell: vocals - Ed: b. vox & guitars - Tom Withers: drums & vocals - Paul: bass

Some crazy person’s gone and set up a Stupids page on MySpace. Fool

There’s not much in the way of new content, but it’s as good a collection of photos and info on the band as there is anywhere online (I should know because I worte a good portion of it a few years ago).

A real bonus is the inclusion of a couple of tracks that haven’t yet made it onto CD, “Bug Blood” and “Mega-Zombie”. Worth a visit just to hear them. I hadn’t heard either for well over 15 years and it was fun having a listen.