We’ve all had shitty upstairs neighbors at one time or another but rarely does anything good come of it. In 1973 Laurice Marshall‘s friend Simon Potter was living in a flat in London, below a girl named Christine. Described as being a “very homely girl” who “could suck the oxygen out of a room in two minutes”, Christine was totally intolerable and would constantly knock on Potter’s door making it impossible for him to escape her. At wit’s end one night after enduring a visit from Christine, Simon told Laurice exactly what he’d like to do to her, in 20 minutes they wrote a song about it, and released it as a single under the name GRUDGE (with b side “I’m Gonna Smash Your Face In”) and the rest is history. “When Christine Comes Around” is one of those songs that doesn’t deserve to be forgotten. Undeniably catchy and perfectly twisted, it’s pretty impossible not to love this pre-punk classic.
Harry Howes of ALMOST READY/LAST LAUGH/MIGHTY MOUTH has been busy unearthing and re-releasing lost Laurice classics, the latest being the never been heard before demo version of “When Christine Comes Around”. I thought my mind was blown when I first heard the originally released version of this song but my head fully exploded upon first listen of this demo…punk before punk indeed, hatred never sounded so good. You won’t be able to get your hands on a copy of this for another month but be the first of your friends to hear it HERE ON THE HASSLE, presented to the masses for the first time, ever.