This isn't anything to do with Darwinian theory. This is a short bit about how our ideas and inspirations have changed during the band's lifetime.

Cling to your innocence

When we started out, we were all about 16 years old. How did we even get started as a 'political' band at all? It certainly wasn't planned. The first song we ever wrote was "The Flowers Are Dead", which seems to be about the rise of far-right-wing parties in Europe. Why did we care about that? I don't know. It just came out like that. Everything we have ever done has been completely natural, apart from a few failed attempts at radio-friendly hits (more on that elsewhere). Like many kids of a similar age, we were just starting to think beyond the classroom walls. We discovered the words of Chomsky and other leftist/liberal writers, and were blown away by this vast sea of confusion and injustice that we had only suspected may exist. Why was nobody talking about this stuff? It seemed more important than just about anything at the time. Was that naive? Most probably, but there is something to be said for the honesty of naivety, something which is all too often lost to snide cynicism as one grows older.

Are we a political band? We never embraced that label. We knew full well that our opinions and beliefs were only partially formed. We had pieced together one corner of a jigsaw and we didn't feel like waiting until the end. That was fine though, as most people preferred to leave the pieces safely in the box. That gave us the right to offer our thoughts, and at least we had the guts to do that.

Now approaching the grand old age of 21, I can recognise that dry, relentless approach we took back then. I can almost picture the pages which we lifted our ideas from. Since our first two albums, my attitude to many things has changed to some degree. However, I have no regret for anything we have ever said, so long as we were being honest at the time. What more can you ask of someone than to state his truth at that particular moment in time?

The more you know, the more you know you don't know

The above is what we evolved into. It's like scaling the summit of a mountain, only to find that a hundred new peaks have been revealed by this new viewpoint. Curiosity seems to plot a path to confusion. By now, and with this album, we have had time to digest a lot of what we had tended to vomit straight up into the first two records. I hope that this record is more human than the last, and that the listener can come to know more about our attitudes and motives. It is a hopeful farewell, before we all set off towards that next summit. So, find a peak and climb. Don't worry about what awaits at the top.

Michael Bromley, August 2004