The Wedding Present are an indie rock group formed in Leeds, England in 198… Read Full Bio ↴The Wedding Present are an indie rock group formed in Leeds, England in 1984. They evolved from the ashes of The Lost Pandas. Their music has evolved from fast-paced indie rock in the vein of their most obvious influences The Fall, Buzzcocks and The Go-Betweens, to more varied forms. Throughout their career, they have been led by vocalist and guitarist David Gedge, the band's only constant member.

The Lost Pandas fell apart in 1984 when guitarist Michael Duane (later of dustDevils) was sacked, and Panda's drummer Jaz Rigby followed in protest. Gedge and the Pandas' bass player, Keith Gregory, decided to continue the band, renaming it The Wedding Present.

Gedge wanted to use the name "The Wedding Present" in honour of one of his favourite bands,The Birthday Party.

Gedge and Gregory recruited an old schoolmate of Gedge's, Peter Solowka, to play guitar and auditioned a string of drummers, including Mike Bedford, with whom they recorded a demo tape, before settling on Shaun Charman. The country's clubs and bars were toured as the band prepared for the recording of their first, self-financed single.

After some consideration, "Go Out and Get 'Em, Boy!" was chosen over early favourite "Will You Be Up There?". The A-side features drumming by hired hand Julian Sowa with Charman on its B-side. The single was released on the band's own Reception Records label with distribution through Red Rhino. Although Reception was only intended to be a vehicle for the release of their own material, it also released a number of singles by This Poison! and Cud.

Two more singles followed that did well on the independent charts and the band was spotted by veteran BBC radio DJ John Peel, who immediately started championing them and invited them to do a radio session, starting a long collaboration.

By the time the band started work on their debut album, a number of independent and major record companies showed interest, but the band declined all offers and decided to keep releasing their material themselves. The album was released in 1987 and titled George Best after the well-known Northern Irish football player. Disagreement on production values with the record's producer, Chris Allison, led to the product being remixed by the band and their engineer, Steve Lyon. The larger part of these conflicts seemed to lie with the personal and musical incompatibility of Allison and Charman.

Upon its release, the album was critically acclaimed and the band were soon lumped in with some of their peers as the 'shambling' or C86 scene, a categorization that they vehemently declined (although they were featured on the original C86 compilation). Musically, the album featured fast-paced rhythm guitar attacks; lyrically, apart from a few tentative excursions into social critique ("All This and More") and politics ("All About Eve"), Gedge's main concerns (which would become his trademark) were love, lust, heartbreak and revenge. Soon after the release of George Best, the early singles and radio sessions were compiled and released as Tommy (1985-1987).

With the departure of Charman very early on in 1988, Simon Smith took up the drum stool and follow up album, 1989's Bizarro was again popular with the music weeklies.

When Solowka, who has Ukrainian roots, started fooling around with a Ukrainian folk tune during one of their many Peel sessions, the idea arose to devote some of their radio time to recording their versions of Ukrainian and Russian folk song, encouraged by Peel. To this end, two guest musicians were invited, singer/violin player Len Liggins and mandolin player Roman Remeynes, and three Peel sessions were recorded with Gedge temporarily limiting himself to playing rhythm guitar and arranging the songs.

The band planned on releasing eight cuts from the Ukrainian sessions on a 10" LP and an initial batch was pressed when Red Rhino went into receivership. Rather than trying to find a new distribution company, the band decided to fold their Reception label altogether and sign with a regular record company: RCA. Solowka, Liggins, and Remeynes later split from the band to concentrate on the Ukrainian material as the band The Ukrainians.

Seamonsters is the third studio album by English rock band The Wedding Present. It was recorded in ten days in 1991 by American producer Steve Albini at Pachyderm Studio in Cannon Falls, Minnesota. Albini had previously recorded two EPs with the group, Brassneck and 3 Songs and, like those records, Seamonsters has a rougher, harsher overall sound than the group's earlier two albums.

Solowka was replaced by Paul Dorrington and the band in 1992 released a single every month, and each of these songs charted before being released as compilations of both the A and B-sides. Each of these 12 singles hit the UK Top 40 and the band tied Elvis Presley's record of most Top 40 singles in the span of a year.

Following a quiet 1993 in which Gregory left and was replaced by Darren Belk, they followed up their record-breaking 1992 year with a new LP in 1994 called "Watusi". Following this, Dorrington left, Belk moved to guitar and they temporarily became a 3-piece before Jayne Lockey arrived. A mini LP, helpfully called "Mini" drove up early '96 shortly before "Saturnalia" zoomed in Summer '96 (along with the addition of new guitarist Simon Cleave after Belk's depature).

Following a gig in January 1997, Gedge decided to rest the Wedding Present name and started performing as Cinerama however while recording a new Cinerama album in 2004 he decided to resurrect the name the Wedding Present.

The first Wedding Present single in 7 years was released in November 2004 followed by an album in February 2005. This line-up was Gedge, Cleave, bassist Terry de Castro and drummer Kari Paavola. Paavola declined to tour and subsequently left replaced by Simon Pearson and then Graeme Ramsey. Simon Cleave left early 2006 but rejoined in 2009. His 3 year void was filled by guitarist Christopher McConville.

In more musical chairs, guitarist Cleave departed again later in 2009 due to ill health. The vacant guitar position was actually snabbed by the drummer, Ramsay, who was replaced on the drum stool by Charlie Layton (who had previously served for a very short time in 2006). Following this in Summer 2010, long-serving bassist, Terry de Castro, also vacated to be replaced by Pepe le Moko. A year later, in late 2011, after the recording of the band's 8th studio album, Valentina, Ramsay departed to be replaced by (ex-The Young Playthings and The Pipettes), Patrick Alexander.

The band emerged in February 2013 with yet another new line-up after the sacking of le Moko and Alexander - bassist Jen Schwartz (from Me of a Kind) and guitarist Geoff Maddock (from Goldenhorse).

For more information please visit www.scopitones.co.uk

Big Rat
The Wedding Present Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

And there's something I've got
To tell you and I'm not
Sure how to put it in words
I had a feeling you might
Have guessed that something's not right
Maybe you've already heard

I don't know

I don't know
I don't know

Oh please don't start crying
I've not been lying
I just didn't tell you it all
We just talked but then she
Stopped smiling when she
Asked me to give her a call

I don't know
I don't know
I don't know

I'm a big rat, but I get scared
When you start talking like that
Why won't you see that she meant
Absolutely nothing to me

I can't remember just what
Happened next but I'm not
Sure I even had any fun
Oh, she's amusing...
But I was so scared of losing you, well
After all that I've done

I don't know
I don't know
I don't know

I'm a big rat, but I get scared
When you start talking like that
Why don't you see that she meant
Absolutely nothing to me

I'm a big rat, but I get scared
When you start talking like that

Oh why can't you see that she meant
Absolutely nothing to me

Overall Meaning

The Wedding Present's song "Big Rat" is a heart-wrenching and brutally honest confession of infidelity. The opening lines of the song reveal that the singer has been unfaithful to his partner and is hesitant about confessing his wrongdoing to them. He is unsure of how to express his guilt and shame and is afraid of the consequences of his actions. The lyrics convey a sense of vulnerability and desperation as he struggles to find the right words to communicate his feelings.

As the song progresses, the singer reveals that he had an encounter with another woman that his partner may already know about. He is quick to emphasize that he did not lie, but rather omitted important information about the incident. The chorus repeats the line "I'm a big rat, but I get scared when you start talking like that" which further emphasizes the singer's fear of being caught and losing his partner's trust and love.

Despite his regret and remorse, the singer finds it hard to resist the temptation of the other woman. He describes her as "amusing" but acknowledges that his fear of losing his partner prevented him from fully enjoying the experience. The song ends with the singer pleading for his partner's forgiveness and understanding, insisting that the other woman meant nothing to him.

Overall, "Big Rat" is a poignant exploration of the complexities of infidelity and the emotional turmoil it can cause. It showcases The Wedding Present's ability to convey raw and intense emotions through their music and lyrics.

Line by Line Meaning

And there's something I've got
I have something to tell you

To tell you and I'm not
I want to tell you, but I am not sure how to express myself

Sure how to put it in words
I'm not sure how to articulate my feelings

I had a feeling you might
I thought you might have an inkling of what I want to say

Have guessed that something's not right
I think you know that something is amiss

Maybe you've already heard
Perhaps you already know what I'm about to say

Oh please don't start crying
I don't want you to cry

I've not been lying
I haven't lied to you

I just didn't tell you it all
I omitted some important details

We just talked but then she
I only talked with her

Stopped smiling when she
She stopped smiling at me when she