Sick On You

The Hollywood Brats are the greatest band you’ve never heard of.

Recording one near-perfect punk album in 1974, they were tragically ahead of their time.

With only a guitar, a tatty copy of the Melody Maker and his template for the perfect band, Andrew Matheson set out, in 1971, to make musical history. His band, The Hollywood Brats, were pre-punk prophets – uncompromising, ultra-thin, wild, untameable and outrageous. But thrown into the crazy world of the 1970s London music scene, the Brats ultimately fell foul of the crooks and heavies that ran it and an industry that just wasn’t ready for them.

Directly inspiring the London SS, the Clash, Malcolm McLaren and the Sex Pistols, The Hollywood Brats imploded too soon to share the glory. Punk’s answer to Withnail and I, Sick On You is a startling, funny and brilliantly entertaining period memoir about never quite achieving success, despite flying so close to greatness.

Andrew Matheson was a founding member of The Hollywood Brats, the band that never really was. When the group prematurely imploded, Andrew left the music industry in a huff to play football in North America. When he became exhausted by chasing a fat man called Eusebio around the pitch for 90 minutes, he rejoined the world of music with ‘Monterey Shoes'. He has since been writing music, producing, publishing magazine articles and recording more critically acclaimed music. Although now thrice removed from the louche lounge-wizard he once was he still has all his own hair and the majority of his own teeth, and is looking forward to the re-release of the classic Brats music by Cherry Red Records.