Is it a band, is it a prank, is it a concept? There is something very meta about the Moonlandingz, a group who began life as a fictional construct yet now find themselves, through strange happenstance, edging towards a more conventional existence.
They began life as the central conceit on Sheffield electro-duo Eccentronic Research Council’s excellent recent concept album, Johnny Rocket, Narcissist & Music Machine … I’m Your Biggest Fan. Its avant-garde psych-rock serves as the backdrop for Maxine Peake to play a stalker infatuated with a small-town Yorkshire glam-rock star, Johnny Rocket, singer with the Moonlandingz.
ERC drafted in two of Fat White Family, Lias Saoudi and Saul Adamczewski, to front the fictitious band and one of their tracks, Sweet Saturn Mine, found itself on heavy rotation on BBC 6 Music. The Moonlandingz are thus now out on tour, with a full album threatened further down the line.
On the ERC album Peake describes the Moonlandingz as a “cosmic synth krautabilly group doing fuzzy Joe Meek-style pop”, which is pretty on the money, but live they are a far more rock’n’roll affair. This is primarily down to the feral antics and louche anarchy of singer Saoudi, a fantastic front man who seems perpetually to be on the verge of either collapse or combustion.
On the rambunctious Man In Me Lyfe he is a taut, twitching Tasmanian devil, channelling both the Cramps and Iggy Pop at his most messianic; the drawled Lay Your Head Down On The Road could be the Velvet Underground essaying country and western from deep inside a K-hole. Johnny Rocket may not exist but he is still a far better rock star than most current pretenders.
