Cassetteboy are flogging a Dead Horse Label: Barry’s Bootlegs Cat. No. BAZ010 Release Date: October 10 th 2005 Cut and paste scallywags Cassetteboy are back with the long awaited follow up to their 2002 album ‘The Parker Tapes’. Long awaited by their label Barry’s Bootlegs anyway. Barry’s got fines to pay, and the suitcase full of dodgy gear down the market just ain’t bringing home the bacon.Since the release of ‘The Parker Tapes’ (“The most anarchic example of plunderphonics so far” – BBCi), Cassetteboy have put together two compilation albums: ‘Inside a Whale’s Cock Vol. 1’ with DJ Rubbish (“An excellent split LP of vicious cut-up satire” – NME), and ‘Mick’s Tape’ (“This load of old shit’ – Bizarre Magazine).‘Dead Horse’ is the real deal – the second proper Cassetteboy album. It has been painstakingly constructed from thousands of audio snippets taken from TV, radio, film and popular music. As usual, none of the samples have been cleared. The boys would really appreciate it if you didn’t mention the specific copyrights that they are infringing. The last thing they need is Michael Jackson coming after them – have you seen him? He looks terrifying.

‘Dead Horse’ is partly a product of Cassetteboy’s live shows. The only time Barry could coax them into producing any new material was immediately before a gig, and these tracks form the basis of the new album. As a result, ‘Dead Horse’ is more upbeat and focused than ‘The Parker Tapes’, with many tracks attacking specific targets or issues. The War On Terror is covered on various tracks, including cut up speeches by George W Bush and Tony Blair. Pop culture targets include Harry Potter and The Streets, and there are comments on topics such as binge drinking and death. There is also a dash of the meaningless nonsense that defined ‘The Parker Tapes’.

Cassetteboy are embarking on a small tour (with DJ Rubbish) in support of the album, after which they intend to retire from the live arena. The dates are as follows:

For further information, please email:

barrysbootlegs@hotmail.com AND deadhorsealbum@hotmail.com

Some quotes from Cassetteboy about ‘Dead Horse’:

Fictional interviewer: Why is the album called ‘Dead Horse’?

Mark Cassette: We decided on the title ages ago, at a time when we were very disillusioned with the whole Cassetteboy thing. The other possible title was ‘The Final Nail’. Then when we actually made the album, we realised that we still liked doing it, so we ended up with a very positive, upbeat album with a rather miserable title.

Steve Boy: We told Barry that we weren’t going to do any more albums. So he started leaving animal corpses around our flat. Small ones at first, mice, voles, that sort of thing. One day I came home to find a dead horse in the bath, and that’s when we gave in.

Simon Bates: How is the album different from ‘The Parker Tapes’?

Mark Cassette: ‘Dead Horse’ is mainly the tracks that we’ve been playing live. Most of ‘The Parker Tapes’ was quite slow and meandering, not the sort of thing you can do in front of an audience. For gigs we needed punchier, more immediate material, so it’s different in that respect. ‘Dead Horse’ is our ‘pop’ album, although I don’t think they’ll be playing it on Radio One.

Steve Boy: Basically the music and tracks, they’re different from the ones on ‘The Parker Tapes’. And the artwork is different. They’re different albums.

New Kids On The Block: What about ‘Inside a Whale’s Cock’ and ‘Mick’s Tape’?

Mark Cassette: They were compilation albums with our material linking tracks by other people. ‘Dead Horse’ is all Cassetteboy.

Steve Boy: ‘Mick’s Tape’ was made from a very limited pool of source material, stuff the record label already owned. For this one we stole material from everywhere, so it’s better. It’s good to steal.

Margo Ledbetter: Describe your live shows.

Mark Cassette: We wear masks and various disguises. We get drunk and jump up and down while Barry plays a CD that we prepared earlier. If the audience is really lucky, one of us will be so pissed that he’ll fall off the stage.

Steve Boy: I hate doing gigs. We’ve decided that from now on we’re only doing gigs if we get paid a thousand pounds or get flown to the venue in a helicopter.

Mark Cassette: I should just point out that in no way is our show worth a thousand pounds. I would like to ride in a helicopter though.

Royal Leamington Spa : How do you create an album like ‘Dead Horse’?

Mark Cassette: You spend a very long time recording stuff off the telly, then listen to it once for interesting phrases, then again for bits that go with those phrases, then again to try to construct some kind of narrative, then probably a few more times to try to make swear words. It takes a long time.

A nice Greek restaurant: Would you say your sound had matured?

Mark Cassette: It’s developed, it hasn’t matured. If anything there’s more swearing on this album, because we’ve got better at making swearwords. (Listen to track 39)

Steve Boy: We’ve banned ourselves from making the word ‘cunt’ out of ‘country’. It’s just too easy.

Mark: The last few tracks we did for the album, like ‘Superficial Good Vibe?’, ‘Dolmio and Teabags Crindian’ and ‘Meh’ have hardly any swearing because we got bored of it. I did make a ‘masturbation’ though, that was quite a challenge.

Dave the parsnip: Where do you get all your crazy ideas from?

Mark Cassette: Fuck off Dave.

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