Biography

After a brief break following The Wonder Stuff's final performance at the Phoenix Festival, Malcolm Treece and Paul Clifford continued to work together.  They were initially joined by Then Jericho's Steve Wren on drums and, later, by Ange Dolittle - former lead singer with Eat.

As the foursome continued to work on new material, Steve was faced with decision of whether to commit himself to regular touring and periods away from home or remain closer to his family having recently become a father.  Around November 1995, he left the group and whilst the remaining members of the group looked for his replacement, they contacted Martin Gilks to ask if he would help them out for a short while and WeKnowWhereYouLive were formed.

The early part of 1995 was spent by the band rehearsing and recording - though the group also liked to point out that they played a lot of ten-pin bowling as well! In April, the first fruits of these rehearsals sessions were placed onto a cassette and distributed to close friends and family for approval.

In the last week of May they played their first tour, stopping at thirteen towns and cities across England and Scotland.  Each gig showcased the new material with the exception of some of the dates where they played the intro to 'The Size Of A Cow' before Ange would ask "What's this shit?" and launch into another new track.

At the first ten dates of their debut tour, a free single was given to the first 50 people through the doors containing two exclusive demo recordings, 'Mental Hygiene' and 'Draped'. Some copies made their way to various record stations with 'Mental Hygiene' gaining a reasonable amount of airplay on both the Evening Session programme on BBC Radio One and the more alternative shows on local radio. Talking about the group in the NME, Malcolm described the new music as "a lot harder and noisier than the stuff we were doing at the end. It's more like the earlier stuff rather than the things we went into."

The group made their festival debut at Reading on August 25th. Sadly, after the encouraging reviews of their earlier small venue gigs, and despite what was essentially a good performance, the magazine critics savaged them referring to them, in some instances, as the "old back row" and "dregs" of The Wonder Stuff.

In the September issue of the American music industry magazine Ice, it was announced that the group would be releasing their first commercially available single at the end of the month. The group's name was now confirmed as being separate words rather than being one continuous phrase.

We Know Where You Live's debut single came out on November on the newly formed Hatched, Matched and Dispatched record label.  A live track previously titled 'Meanwhile' had been reworked into 'Don't Be Too Honest'.  The single was aimed to be a taster for their debut album, also produced by Dobson, which was initially pencilled in for a January/February '96 release.  The artwork for the single was based on a painting of Jesus after coming down off the cross by Italian artist Mantegna and delays in getting permission for its use and higher than expected advance orders from record shops led to the release being put back for a week.

Though the single reached number five in the independent singles chart, a position in the national singles chart wasn't so easy to get with the 7" single being limited to 1,000 copies which were only distributed to independent record shops. Indeed, such was the uncertainty about the success of the release that many record shops - including some of the larger chains - never even stocked copies of the CD single.

The end of January was a particularly black period for the group.  In the space of one week, Martin Gilks left the group (rumoured to be for the same reasons as his predecessor - he wasn't happy with the regular touring requirements and wanted to concentrate on his other business projects), the group's manager Graham Carpenter resigned his position and Polydor, who had held an option on the services of the group, withdrew their interest.

Gilks' replacement was announced in late March - Jim Ledbetter, previously of Cornwall-based group Limousine. To introduce their fans to him - and him to the fans - the group embarked on a nine-date tour of Southern England. To coincide with the tour, it was announced that the group's second commercially available single, 'Draped', would be released at the end of May.

During a break in the touring schedule, the group entered the Greenhouse Studios for more recording sessions, with Pat Collier at the mixing helm. Though no long-player was now expected until Winter '96, the group had already recorded enough material to fill an album and at one time it was suggested that the 'Draped' single may be replaced by another if they felt that something newer would serve their promotion better.

'Draped' was released at the start of July, this time on Noise Factory Records.  The single, confusingly with all tracks still featuring Martin Gilks on drums, contained a new recording of 'Draped' coupled with the much-requested demo version of 'Mental Hygiene' and another demo track which always proved popular when played live, 'Crude Manipulator'.

In mid-August, Paul Clifford decided to part company with the group. Though no official reason was given, it was thought that finances played a major part in his decision to leave. Nearly two years since their formation and the group were still in almost the same career position as when they had formed. They were still mainly playing the pub circuit and no major record deal was on the horizon. Malcolm and Ange both had additional incomes but Paul hadn't and the cost of partially financing the group may have eventually proved too much.

Within a few weeks of Paul leaving, Jim also left.  Ange and Malcolm continued to come up with ideas for new material for a short while before they decided to draw the chapter to a close.

2006 - An Update...

For almost ten years, the We Know Where You Live story remained unchanged.  Some of the tracks had an occasional airing as Ange reworked them as part of the live/recorded work he performed with subsequent groups.

Then came the news in April 2006 that Martin Gilks had been killed following a road accident.  Martin's family opened an online book of condolences and asked for any donations to be sent to the CARE charity home in Ironbridge.    This led to a increased discussions about Martin and the groups he had worked with including We Know Where You Live.  Rob Stokes, of the Room 512 website, decided to investigate the possibility of the group's demo tracks ever publicly seeing the light of day only to fine out it was unlikely.  As a result, discussions took place with the surviving members of the group and Martin's family with a view to a private pressing of the album exclusively available through the Room 512 website with all profits going to the CARE charity.

The album, It's Nice To Be Nice, was released on December 11th.  Released as a double album containing demo recordings (including three tracks featuring Big Jim Ledbetter) combined with a disc of live tracks recorded at Manchester's Roadhouse in late 1995 and Windsor's Old Trout (right) earlier in the year - the latter closing the album as it was the final concert played at the venue before it was shut down to make way for a 'chain' pub.

The album would only be available as a limited pressing of 1000 copies, with some being used for promotional purposes thus making this a rare opportunity to catch the group in action both in the studio and performing live.  More information on the album is available here.