Product Code Database
Babybird are an English rock band formed by songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Stephen Jones, who has been releasing music since 1995. While Jones' early solo work was released under the "Baby Bird" name, the altered "Babybird" was first used to distinguish the full band line-up that has changed often over the years. However, in recent years, Jones has recorded many of the Babybird albums himself, in addition to recording as a solo artist, and under various aliases including Death of the Neighbourhood, Trucker, Black Reindeer, Deluder, Arthritis Kid and others.
Stephen Jones started writing and recording songs at home and his first collection of these demos, I Was Born a Man, was released in July 1995 using the name Baby Bird. He formed a band in order to tour and promote this work. In 1996, Babybird signed to Echo Records and their first single was released in July 1996. Babybird were dropped from their record label in 2000 after their third album, Bugged, had poor sales. The band then split. Jones continued on his own, writing fiction, releasing solo work and created the score for the film Blessed (2004). In October 2005, the band reformed with three members and created the album Between My Ears There Is Nothing But Music, released in September 2006. They went on tour in November 2009 and then split again in 2013. After a number of Babybird releases on Bandcamp from 2015, Jones took the band back out on tour in late 2017 with a new line up. A compilation album Happy Stupid Nothing was released in 2019, featuring a selection of Babybird tracks from 2015 onwards.
The group's second single, "You're Gorgeous", reached number 3 in the UK in October 1996, and was one of the biggest selling singles of the year, going on to chart around the world. Jones has declared it is a feminist song. However, for its message, it presented a more commercial face to the public in comparison to Jones's earlier work, as well as in comparison to the rest of the material on the Ugly Beautiful album. The album produced two more hit singles in "Candy Girl" and "Cornershop".
In 1997 the band returned to the studio, with producer Darren Allison. They recorded two new tracks - a brand new version of "Bad Shave", and a re-working of "CFC". These new tracks were included on the 1997 U.S. release of Ugly Beautiful.
Babybird returned, minus keyboardist Huw Chadbourn, in 1998 with There's Something Going On, preceded by a single, "Bad Old Man". The album was a modest success and was followed by further minor hits, "If You'll Be Mine" and "Back Together".
In 2000, a line-up of Babybird comprising Jones, Scott and Matt Hay created a third album. Bugged. Sales were poor and the two singles from it, "The F-Word" (later the theme tune to Gordon Ramsay's UK TV cookery show of the same name) and "Out of Sight" barely dented the charts. Babybird were dropped by their record label soon after. A third single from the album, "Fireflies" / "Getaway" was released on Animal Noise Records, but sold few copies. The band subsequently split.
Jones went on to write fiction, release solo work and score a film, Blessed, in 2004. In October 2005, a posting on the Babybird website announced that the band had reformed as a three-piece featuring Jones, Scott and Robert Gregory. An album, Between My Ears There Is Nothing But Music was released on 25 September 2006.
In 2013, Stephen Jones announced via his Twitter feed that Babybird was no more. He launched his own site at Bandcamp, and released a number of albums under aliases such as "Black Reindeer", "Deluder", "Arthritis Kid", "The Great Sadness" and "Trucker".
In 2015, Jones started trading under the Babybird name again, reforming the band as a live unit in 2017 and in early 2019, toured as support to Dodgy with his new line-up. A number of Babybird tracks from 2015 onwards were released on 1 March 2019 as a compilation album Happy Stupid Nothing. Just a few months later, it was announced that another album Photosynthesis would be released in July 2019. As well as these, Jones has been releasing a prolific amount of new Babybird albums via Bandcamp, often selling them as unique limited edition CDs.
| 1995 | I Was Born a Man (as Baby Bird)
| — | — | |
Bad Shave (as Baby Bird)
| — | — | ||
Fatherhood (as Baby Bird)
| — | — | ||
| 1996 | The Happiest Man Alive (as Baby Bird)
| 127 | — | |
Dying Happy (as Baby Bird)
| — | — | ||
Ugly Beautiful
| 9 | 15 | ||
| 1998 | There's Something Going On
| 28 | — | |
| 2000 | Bugged
| 104 | — | |
| 2006 | Between My Ears There Is Nothing But Music
| — | — | |
| 2010 | Ex-Maniac
| 186 | — | |
| 2011 | The Pleasures of Self Destruction
| — | — | |
| 2015 | The Last Album
| — | — | |
Back to the Womb
| — | — | ||
| 2016 | Life After Death
| — | — | |
Take My Air
| — | — | ||
| 2017 | The Wrong Words
| — | — | |
I Miss Myself
| — | — | ||
I Miss Myself 2
| — | — | ||
People Do Stupid Things
| — | — | ||
King of Nothing Part One
| — | — | ||
| 2018 | King of Nothing Part Two
| — | — | |
| 2018 | Selfies Inside The Coffin
| — | — | |
| 2019 | NOTPOP/Toothpaste For The Soul
| — | — | |
| 2019 | Photosynthesis
| — | — |
| 1997 | The Greatest Hits (as Baby Bird)
|
| 2002 | The Original Lo-Fi (boxset) (as Baby Bird)
|
| 2004 | Best of Babybird
|
| 2012 | The Original Lo-Fi Greatest Hits
|
| 2013 | Outtakes
|
| 2014 | A Personal Lo-Fi Mixtape: Part One (as Baby Bird)
|
A Personal Lo-Fi Mixtape: Part Two (as Baby Bird)
| |
| 2015 | Roadkiller
|
Roadtripper
| |
Roadfiller
| |
Road
| |
Missing Lofi Part One
| |
Rehearsal Tapes
| |
Missing Lofi 2
| |
Missing Lofi 3: Songs
| |
Missing Lofi 3: Soundtracks
| |
Last Album Outtakes
| |
Fatherhood2 (as Baby Bird)
| |
| 2016 | People Do Stupid Things
|
| 2017 | KONpilation
|
| 2019 | Happy Stupid Nothing
|
| 2012 | Live at the Electric Ballroom Bootleg 1996
|
| 2015 | Live Sessions 1995–8 Volume One
|
Live Sessions 1995–8 Volume 2
| |
Cambridge Junction 1998
| |
Babybird Live in Vienna 2000
| |
| 2018 | Babybird Live in Koln at the Luxor
|
| 1995 ! scope="row" | "Snake Caves" / "Baby Lemonade" (as Baby Bird) | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | ||
| 1996 ! scope="row" | "Goodnight" | 28 | — | — | — | — | — | — | Ugly Beautiful | |
| 1997 ! scope="row" | "Candy Girl" | 14 | 184 | — | — | — | — | — | ||
| 1998 ! scope="row" | "Bad Old Man" | 31 | — | — | — | — | — | — | There's Something Going On | |
| 1999 ! scope="row" | "Back Together" | 22 | — | — | — | — | — | — | ||
| 2000 ! scope="row" | "The F-Word" | 35 | — | — | — | — | — | — | Bugged | |
| 2006 ! scope="row" | "Too Much" / "Dive" | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | Between My Ears There's Nothing But Music | |
| 2010 ! scope="row" | "Unloveable" | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | Ex-Maniac | |
| 2019 ! scope="row" | "King of Nothing" | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | Happy Stupid Nothing | |
| 2020 ! scope="row" | "In Place of Love" | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
|
|
