Milltown Brothers are an English

indie Indie is a short form of "independence" or "independent"; it may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Gaming *Independent video game development, video games created without financial backing from large companies *Indie game, any game (board ...

band Band or BAND may refer to: Places *Bánd, a village in Hungary *Band, Iran, a village in Urmia County, West Azerbaijan Province, Iran *Band, Mureș, a commune in Romania * Band-e Majid Khan, a village in Bukan County, West Azerbaijan Province, I ...

from

Colne Colne () is a market town and civil parish in the Borough of Pendle in Lancashire, England. Located northeast of Nelson, north-east of Burnley, east of Preston and west of Leeds. The town should not be confused with the unrelated Colne Val ...

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancashi ...

, England.

Career

Their first release, in 1989, was the "Coming From The Mill" EP which became single of the week in the ''

NME ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...

magazine A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...

, and featured the songs "Roses", "We've Got Time" and "Something On My Mind". The same publication tipped Milltown Brothers for

stardom ''Stardom'' is a 2000 Canadian comedy-drama film directed by Denys Arcand and written by J.Jacob Potashnik and Arcand. It stars Jessica Paré and Dan Aykroyd. It tells the story of a young girl who tries to cope with her rise to stardom after bei ...

in the 1990s, along with The Hoovers,

Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine (also known as Carter USM or simply Carter) were an English indie rock band formed in 1987 by singer Jim "Jim Bob" Morrison and guitarist Les "Fruitbat" Carter. They made their name with a distinctive style o ...

, The Charlatans,

The Mock Turtles The Mock Turtles are an English indie rock band, formed in Middleton, Greater Manchester, in 1985, who enjoyed some success in the early 1990s. Their most famous song " Can You Dig It?", which was released in the UK in 1991, charted at numb ...

and

New Fast Automatic Daffodils New Fast Automatic Daffodils (later shortened to New FADS) were an alternative rock group from Manchester, England, active between 1988 and 1995. History The band was formed in 1988 by former members of the punk rock group Pariah.Strong, Mart ...

. The band's second indie

single Single may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Single (music), a song release Songs * "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield song), 2004 * "Single" (New Kids on the Block and Ne-Yo song), 2008 * "Single" (William Wei song), 2016 * "Single", by ...

was "Which Way Should I Jump", with "Silvertown" as the

B-side The A-side and B-side are the two sides of phonograph records and cassettes; these terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side usually features a recording that its artist, producer, or record compan ...

. After the band signed to

A&M Records A&M Records was an American record label founded as an independent company by Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss in 1962. Due to the success of the discography A&M released, the label garnered interest and was acquired by PolyGram in 1989 and began distr ...

worldwide in 1990, "Which Way Should I Jump?" was re-recorded and entered the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

at number 38, and reached number 10 in the

U.S. The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

Modern Rock Modern rock is an umbrella term used to describe rock music that is found on college rock radio stations. Some radio stations use this term to distinguish themselves from classic rock, which is based in 1960s–1980s rock music. Radio format Mod ...

chart A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tabu ...

. An

album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

, called ''Slinky'', followed. It peaked at number 27 in the

UK Albums Chart The Official Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales and (from March 2015) audio streaming in the United Kingdom. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the Official Charts C ...

. Q Magazine described it as the "Byrds with hard-edged contemporary pop and upfront vocals". The next single released from the album was "Here I Stand", which was also used as the

theme tune Theme music is a musical composition that is often written specifically for radio programming, television shows, video games, or films and is usually played during the title sequence, opening credits, closing credits, and in some instances at so ...

for the

television programme A television show – or simply TV show – is any content produced for viewing on a television set which can be broadcast via over-the-air, satellite, or cable, excluding breaking news, advertisements, or trailers that are typically placed betw ...

, ''

Preston Front ''All Quiet on the Preston Front'' is a BBC comedy drama about a group of friends in the fictional Lancashire town of Roker Bridge, and their links to the local Territorial Army infantry platoon. It was created by Tim Firth. Episodes Three se ...

''. It peaked at number 41 in the

. They were supported on the

tour Tour or Tours may refer to: Travel * Tourism, travel for pleasure * Tour of duty, a period of time spent in military service * Campus tour, a journey through a college or university's campus * Guided tour, a journey through a location, directed b ...

to promote this album by Beware the Green Monkey, fronted by Bruce Thomas with Paul Chapman on bass. In 1993, the band released the album ''Valve''. It was not as successful as ''Slinky'' and they left the A&M

label A label (as distinct from signage) is a piece of paper, plastic film, cloth, metal, or other material affixed to a container or product, on which is written or printed information or symbols about the product or item. Information printed dir ...

. It took 10 years for the band to work together again, but in March 2004 they released their third

studio A studio is an artist or worker's workroom. This can be for the purpose of acting, architecture, painting, pottery (ceramics), sculpture, origami, woodworking, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, industrial design ...

album, ''Rubberband'', which was released on their own label Rubber Band Records and made available at their website. In the summer of 2015, Milltown Brothers released their new album ''Long Road'', and again it was self-released. Fraser has also played bass in

Jay Diggins Jay Diggins (born 17 September 1974) is an English singer-songwriter. He is best known for his work with John ParishLakin, Nick"If you fall from grace..." '' Lancaster Guardian'', Lancaster, 14 June 2013. and for turning down an opportunity to ...

' band and is frontman of Greenheart, a band from Lancaster.

Line-up

* Matt Nelson -

Vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...

Guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

* Simon Nelson -

* James Fraser - Bass * Barney Williams -

Organ Organ may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a part of an organism Musical instruments * Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone ** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument ** Hammond ...

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

* Nian Brindle -

Drum The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system, it is a membranophone. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a she ...

Discography

Albums

*''Slinky'' (1991) (No. 27 UK) *''Valve'' (1993) *''Rubberband'' (2004) *''Long Road'' (2015) *''Stockholm'' (2020)

Singles

References

External links

Official websiteYouTube
{{Authority control English indie rock groups