The band began life as The Charlie Tipper Experiment in 2013, releasing an album and a clutch of singles for Breaking Down Recordings.

In 2015 the band became The Charlie Tipper Conspiracy for no real reason other than they thought it would be a good idea to keep people guessing as to what they were up to.

The CTC have a Bristolian pedigree as long as your arm. Longer maybe.

Lead singer Tim was in both the Flatmates and the Five Year Plan in the late ‘80’s, before joining the Beatnik Filmstars* for most of the ‘90s. In the 2000s he headed up Forest Giants and then took part in the Short Stories.

Guitarist Jon Kent was a founder member of another of Bristol’s C86 squad, the Groove Farm, as well as being the original guitarist for the Filmstars.

Bassist Geoff Gorton played in the Harpoons, then later Rorschach and major label outfit Santa Cruz.

Drummer Simon Harris played in a number of Bristol’s lesser punk bands back in the late 70’s and then the Dangerous Roundabouts. He claims he doesn’t remember a lot about it, if truth be told, so more interesting maybe is the fact that his brother was once a roadie for the Damned.

You’d be forgiven for wondering why these people aren’t spending their final days touring the country playing the Walsall and Cricklewood PopFests with their old bands, churning out songs written three decades ago to people who were there watching them three decades ago.

Well things move on. And to prove it the CTE also feature a member who wasn’t even born when Tim played his first gig at Frampton Cotterell Youth Centre in 1982. Harry “Ice Man” Furniss brings his soulful cornet nicely to the party.