Rarely does a band name all by itself make me want to buy an album, but that sure was the case for We’ve Got a Fuzzbox and We’re Gonna Use It; this was also the name of their first album that came out in 1985.  The group featured sisters Maggie (Magz) Dunne (guitar and vocals) and Jo Dunne (bass), plus Vickie (Vix) Perks (vocals) and Tina O’Neill (drums).  The band’s name is often shortened to Fuzzbox (what else can you do?).  

Their flamboyant look and their savvy meld of new wave and punk a la the Go-Go’s with fuzztone made the British band indie rock darlings for a time.  Allmusic gripes that, if anything, they don’t use their fuzzbox enough; but I was always satisfied.  We’ve Got a Fuzzbox and We’re Gonna Use It includes mostly cool original songs but also a cover of the fuzz classic “Spirit in the Sky”; the song was originally released by Norman Greenbaum in late 1969, reaching #1 on the British charts, and was a #1 hit in the UK by another British band Doctor and the Medics in 1986. 

(February 2014)

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Items:    Fuzzbox