About this Site

At HMHB gigs, they wear their hearts on their sleeves. And their oven gloves on their hands. But this loyalty isn’t only articulated through the redesign of kitchen-based protective wear, as a glimpse at the internet will reveal. One fansite consists of full transcriptions and in-depth analysis of every Blackwell lyric ever recorded. The site goes by the attractive strapline of ‘179 Pop Songs Picked Over By Pedants’. My kind of people.

– Nige Tassell, “Mr Gig” (2013)

Chris Rand (AKA here as “Chris The Siteowner” or “CtSO”) writes:

The only thing growing faster than the number of blogs on the internet is the number of blogs quoting Half Man Half Biscuit lyrics. At this rate, we’ll have a Half Man Half Biscuit lyrical event horizon about 2032 where nothing else is ever published.

Trouble is, like darts in soap operas, most of them are so wrong. So with too much time on my hands, obviously, I’ve been trying to rectify the situation, and not only build a complete set of lyrics, but actually get them right (mainly powered by the comments and corrections of many other fans, for which I thank you). The original effort took just over three years, then we had a new album, and another, and… well, let’s hope the job is never finished.

Of course, these lyrics are the copyright of the songwriters, and if they or anyone else has any objections to this non-profit-making site, please contact me and I’ll remove the offending material immediately.

But where should you begin? Right here:

A Beginner’s Guide to Half Man Half Biscuit

Half Man Half Biscuit have been steadily making music since the mid-eighties. Whether you’re new to the band, or catching up with them after many years, a cracking place to start is this 2011 article by Taylor Parkes on The Quietus. Go and have a read. We’ll still be here when you get back in a few minutes.

That should have given you a decent flavour of what the band is all about. But if you want more, watch this seven-minute video made as part of the “John Peel’s Record Collection” series, introduced by the great man’s wife Sheila:

On to the music!

With so many good songs to choose from, there’s no definitive place to start catching up with thirty-something years of Half Man Half Biscuit. Perhaps the best place to start would be the fans’ favourite songs. The latest poll was in 2019, under the guise of the Lux Familiar Cup. Here’s the result of the poll to choose the top 32 songs, which had nearly 400,000 votes from 1,700 listeners. And here’s what happened when we set the top 32 up against each other.

And here’s everything, on Spotify:

More Reading

For lots of complementary stuff to this site, I’ll direct you to Gez’s long-running ‘HMHB Home Page’, where you can also spend hours. And if you found the Taylor Parkes article above interesting, here are loads more from the likes of Kevin Sampson, Julie Burchill, Ben Myers, Peter Ross and Robert Bathurst.

And what about this site?

As the name implies, The Half Man Half Biscuit Lyrics Project is focused on the lyrics to the songs, but in the process it’s also become the most active discussion site on the band. Work your way through our home page if you want to see everything we’ve got to offer. In particular, it’s worth investigating:

Finally… the fans

The fans seem to generate as much curiosity in the media as the band, although neither amounts to much, which may well be a good thing in the long run. The most recent major article was in The Guardian in April 2022. Enjoy:

Half Man Half Biscuit fan article in The Guardian

Website Activity Records

Milestones
First lyrics published23/10/2007
Lyrics from first 11 albums completed07/10/2010
“90 Bisodol (Crimond)” lyrics added10/09/2011 to 10/12/2011
“Urge For Offal” lyrics added11/10/2014 to 22/11/2014
“…Creative Hub…” lyrics added19/05/2018 to 10/06/2018
“The Voltarol Years” lyrics added26/02/2022 to 25/03/2022
Comment NumberDate Reached
123/10/2007
500016/05/2011
1000024/02/2013
1500026/09/2014
2000005/06/2015
2500003/05/2016
3000023/02/2017
3500012/06/2018
4000009/11/2019
4500018/02/2021
5000012/10/2022
Website Visitor Totals
YearVisitorsVisitsTop Referring Sites
2007340488
20081707533081Google, Wikipedia, Stumbleupon
20092796156182Google, Wikipedia, Yahoo, Guardian
20104015285277Google, HMHB.co.uk, Wikipedia, Bing
201150931130506Google, HMHB.co.uk, Bing, Wikipedia
201248755106295Google, HMHB.co.uk, Wikipedia, Bing
201347477113826Google, HMHB.co.uk, Bing, Twitter
201464259164732Google, HMHB.co.uk, Twitter, Bing
201567814167452Google, Facebook, HMHB.co.uk, Twitter
201679093171883Google, Twitter, HMHB.co.uk, Bing
201773900170924Google (74%), Bing, Twitter, HMHB.co.uk
201890471232404Google (66%), Twitter, Bing, Facebook
201973185189519Google (70%), Twitter, Facebook
202073366161121Google (76%), Facebook, Bing, Twitter
202174076158209Google (75%), Bing, Twitter, Facebook
202261158153992Google (60%), Bing, Twitter, Facebook

Days with over 1000 visitors
2011VisitorsVisitsReason
Wed 23 Mar10031131Fred Titmus dies; people searching for his name
2014
Mon 20 Oct13191858“Urge For Offal” release
Tue 21 Oct10141474“Urge For Offal” release, day 2
2015
Sun 27 Dec11341321Lux Familiar Cup Final results
2016
Mon 16 May13571575Mention in this Guardian story
2018
Thu 1 Mar19712400“Creative Hub” announced
Fri 2 Mar17602135“Creative Hub” announced, day 2
Fri 18 May17912473“Creative Hub” release day
Sat 19 May11481615“Creative Hub” release, day 2
Sun 20 May10481510“Creative Hub” release, day 3
Mon 21 May12051724“Creative Hub” release, day 4
Tue 22 May13221806“Creative Hub” release, day 5
Wed 23 May11731694“Creative Hub” release, day 6
Fri 25 May11121617“Creative Hub” release, day 8
Mon 4 Jun11091508More “Creative Hub” discussion
Fri 8 Jun13881958More “Creative Hub” discussion, and London gig
Sat 9 Jun10791683More “Creative Hub” discussion, and London gig
2022
Thu 6 Jan. Epiphany.60976868“Voltarol Years” announced
Fri 7 Jan45925344“Voltarol Years” announced, day 2
Sat 8 Jan10871436“Voltarol Years” announced, day 3
Fri 25 Feb13842260“Voltarol Years” release day
Sat 26 Feb11641840“Voltarol Years” release, day 2
Sun 27 Feb10251702“Voltarol Years” release, day 3
Mon 28 Feb13852070“Voltarol Years” release, day 4
Tue 1 Mar12051842“Voltarol Years” release, day 5
Wed 2 Mar10451677“Voltarol Years” release, day 6
Wed 27 Apr28753627Guardian article about fans
Thu 28 Apr10731461People reading the Guardian article the next day
2023
Sun 14 May10941397Lux Familiar Cup 2023 launch

Oh… and buy the music!

You can buy Half Man Half Biscuit CDs and other merchandise at the online store spun off from their former, long-time record label Probe Plus. The 2022 album “The Voltarol Years” should still be available at all good independent record stores. The music is also available at all the normal download sources too.

You won’t go far wrong with the latest album or any of the preceding six albums, Creative Hub, Urge For Offal, 90 Bisodol (Crimond), CSI: Ambleside, Achtung Bono and Cammell Laird Social Club.

And if you do buy the records, you’re in a small but select group of wonderful people. Here are the high points of Half Man Half Biscuit’s 35-year UK album chart career:

Chart History

Welcome to the world of the band of which John Peel said:

In a decently ordered society members of Half Man Half Biscuit would be routinely carried shoulder high through the streets of every city they visited.

– John Peel (1997)

Chris Rand (“Chris The Siteowner”)
Originally written in September 2007
Email me

(Disclaimer: I’m not some sort of uber-fan: you can find the real ones at any of the band’s gigs. They’re all charming people. All I have is a love for the band and limited ability in website design. Oh, and I have a friend with a son called Archie, and another with a son called Fred. I have been caught wearing a footy shirt over a jumper. I’ve bought soup in cartons. And I know who PFM are. But I do live quite near Chatteris. Which is nice. You can judge me on my musical taste by seeing what I listen to, right here.)

Feel free to link here from your own websites. Thank you to the likes of The Guardian, The Irish Times, The Quietus and the late Word Magazine for doing so. And all the social media mentions you can manage will help spread the word.

You can follow additions to this site on Twitter at @hmhb_lyrics and follow Chris The Siteowner at @ChrisRandWrites

Contacting the Band

This is an unofficial website – please don’t contact me asking for introductions, etc.

Gigs are now handled by Pod at The Gig Cartel: More details here.

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