Over a decade has passed since the Wonder Stuff last released an album, but singer/songwriter Miles Hunt tells Billboard.com little has changed musically on the group's new disc, "Escape From Rubbish Island."
"I would like to tell you we sat down and listened to the four original Wonder Stuff albums, and we rather cleverly designed the band to sound like that," says Hunt. "But we didn't. We just ain't that smart and I think actually what we got with 'Escape from Rubbish Island' is a testament that me and [guitarist] Malc Treece are very slow and haven't developed as musicians or writers. This is what we sound like. It's not all contrived."
After enjoying British stardom and underground U.S. success in the late '80s and early '90s, the Wonder Stuff burned up in 1994, when Hunt felt the band was "more of a business rather than a creative entity."
Eventually, he and Treece teamed up in the late '90s for Stateside acoustic shows, which lead to a full-fledged band reunion, sans fallen bassist Bob Jones, which averaged a dozen or so U.K. shows a year. However, when talk of a new album surfaced, the band split again, with Hunt and Trese maintaining the Wonder Stuff name.
To support "Escape From Rubbish Island," some of which was co-written with Johnny Male (a.k.a. Johnny Glue of Republica), on Reincarnate Music (formerly iMUSIC), the group intends to spend a great deal of 2005 touring Stateside, beginning with a month-long tour that starts Tuesday (April 5) in Asbury Park, N.J.
Feeling particularly creative, Hunt is already looking ahead with plenty of new material ("Sh*t Out of Luck," "The Last Second of the Minute" and "Bad Day for the Wealthy") due to receive stage time on the upcoming outing.
"We're coming over 10 days before the tour starts and the first thing we're going to be doing is laying down tracks for the next album," Hunt says. "By July 31, we should have the next album finished, which we'll probably release in the U.K. in October. I'm very aware of the fact that when I'm feeling this hungry for it, [I want] to keep it going."
As for the future of the Wonder Stuff, Hunt is optimistic. "Hopefully, this is what we get to do," Hunt says. "It's totally up to the audience essentially. But our intention is to keep on doing this until we no longer want to rock, basically. And we all feel very excited to come over and play. We all feel very blessed at the moment."
"I would like to tell you we sat down and listened to the four original Wonder Stuff albums, and we rather cleverly designed the band to sound like that," says Hunt. "But we didn't. We just ain't that smart and I think actually what we got with 'Escape from Rubbish Island' is a testament that me and [guitarist] Malc Treece are very slow and haven't developed as musicians or writers. This is what we sound like. It's not all contrived."
After enjoying British stardom and underground U.S. success in the late '80s and early '90s, the Wonder Stuff burned up in 1994, when Hunt felt the band was "more of a business rather than a creative entity."
Eventually, he and Treece teamed up in the late '90s for Stateside acoustic shows, which lead to a full-fledged band reunion, sans fallen bassist Bob Jones, which averaged a dozen or so U.K. shows a year. However, when talk of a new album surfaced, the band split again, with Hunt and Trese maintaining the Wonder Stuff name.
To support "Escape From Rubbish Island," some of which was co-written with Johnny Male (a.k.a. Johnny Glue of Republica), on Reincarnate Music (formerly iMUSIC), the group intends to spend a great deal of 2005 touring Stateside, beginning with a month-long tour that starts Tuesday (April 5) in Asbury Park, N.J.
Feeling particularly creative, Hunt is already looking ahead with plenty of new material ("Sh*t Out of Luck," "The Last Second of the Minute" and "Bad Day for the Wealthy") due to receive stage time on the upcoming outing.
"We're coming over 10 days before the tour starts and the first thing we're going to be doing is laying down tracks for the next album," Hunt says. "By July 31, we should have the next album finished, which we'll probably release in the U.K. in October. I'm very aware of the fact that when I'm feeling this hungry for it, [I want] to keep it going."
As for the future of the Wonder Stuff, Hunt is optimistic. "Hopefully, this is what we get to do," Hunt says. "It's totally up to the audience essentially. But our intention is to keep on doing this until we no longer want to rock, basically. And we all feel very excited to come over and play. We all feel very blessed at the moment."
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