The Men They Couldn't Hang - The Defiant (2014)

The revered British folk punk group The Men They Couldn’t Hang celebrate their 30th anniversary in 2014 with the release of a brand new album, ‘The Defiant’. Previewed with a sold out London show at Shepherds Bush Empire in April that won rave reviews in The Guardian and on The Arts Desk and an accompanying EP that saw significant specialist airplay on BBC Radio 2, 6 Music BBC Scotland and BBC Wales, the release of ‘The Defiant’ will be followed by a UK tour and a return visit to SBE.

The Men They Couldn't Hang formed in 1984. Championed by John Peel, their debut single 'Green Fields of France' was a huge hit on the UK Indie chart and was no. 3 in Peel’s Festive Fifty for 1984 (behind The Smiiths and Cocteau Twins). The song subsequently appeared on their first album, ‘Night of a Thousand Candles’ [1985]. The following year, they recorded ‘How Green Is The Valley’ with producer Mick Glossop, while by 1988 and their third album ‘Waiting for Bonaparte’, TMTCH had also achieved recognition in mainland Europe for their political comment and raucous live shows.

Touring in support of 1989’s ‘Silvertown’, the band played to a crowd of more than 250,000 in Estonia as communism started to crumble, prior to an unforgettable appearance at Reading Festival. At the height of their career, they recorded the acclaimed ‘Domino Club’ [1990] with producer Pat Collier, but then went on hiatus in 1991 following a ‘farewell tour’. Performing sporadically for the next few years, TMTCH reunited permanently in 1996 and released a new album, ‘Never Born To Follow’ and the ‘Six Pack EP’ [1997] that delighted their fans by displaying a fresh power and vitality to their music. Two ‘Best Of’ collections, ‘Majestic Grill’ and ‘The Mud, The Blood And The Beer’ [both 1998] were eventually followed by the well received albums ‘The Cherry Red Jukebox’ [2003] and the Pat Collier produced ‘Devil On The Wind’ in 2009. TMTCH have spent the last few years touring regularly throughout Europe and playing at numerous festivals alongside the likes of The Levellers, Billy Bragg and Nick Lowe. They also headlined the 10th anniversary commemoration of Joe Strummer’s Acton Town Hall show in November 2012.