Tom Meighan, Kasabian (Photo: Paul Bachmann for Live4ever)
Overnight Spinal Tap made what was already a cartoonish hard rock scene look utterly, irrevocably ridiculous. And according to Billy Bragg, its spirit unwittingly lives on to this day in the form of Kasabian.
“When it’s all down to Kasabian, it’s like…They have an import role to play: they are there to remind us how true Spinal Tap was,” Bragg declares in interview with NME, after starting on the subject of politics in music.
“I’m not a fan, but if you read their interviews as if it was dialogue from Spinal Tap, it’s very entertaining. Especially the stuff Sergio says – he’s Nigel Tufnel. Particularly with the album title, ’48:13′. I’m guessing that’s how long the record is. Someone sent them a CD that just said ‘Kasabian’, and they didn’t know what else to put on it, ‘cos they hadn’t bothered to think up any fucking titles, so they just put the time on and Serge said ‘that is genius’.”
Kasabian’s new album, which is indeed 48 minutes and 13 seconds long, is out this week.